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THIRD   SERIES 


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POEMS    AND    BALLADS 


THIRD   SERIES 


BY 


ALGERNON  CHARLES  SWINBURNE 


TENTH   IMPRESSION 


•  •  •  •  •  ,  •  •  . 


LONDON 

CHATTO    6-   WINDUS 

1910 


<^ 


•  •     .   • 


TO 

WILLIAM     BELL    SCOTT 

POET    AND    PAINTER 

I    DEDICATE    THESE    POEMS 

IN     MEMORY     OF     MANY     YEARS 


267240 


CONTENTS 


March  :  an  Ode     .  , 

The  Commonweal 
The  Armada  .  , 

To  A  Seamew  . 
Pan  and  Thalassius 
A  Ballad  of  Bath 
fyJtU  A  Garden 
A  Rhyme  • 

Baby-Bird    ,  • 

Olive     . 

A  Word  with  the  Wind 
Neap-tide 
By  the  Wayside     . 
Night    . 

In  Time  of  Mourning 
The  Interpreters 
The  Recall  • 

By  Twilight    •  . 


/ 


fKOK 
I 

7 

24 
62 

70 
So 

S3 

85 
8S 

91 
97 
103 
loS 
III 
1 12 
113 
117 
liS 


viii  POEMS  AND  BALLADS, 

TAfTS 

A  Baby's  Epitaph  .           .           .           .  •           .119 

On  the  Death  of  Sir  Henry  Taylor       .  ♦      .     121 

In  Memory  of  John  William  Inchbold  ,           .122 

New  Year's  Day         .            .            .           •  .      .     130 

To  Sir  Richard  F.  Burton        •           ♦  ,            .131 

Nell  Gwyn      .           .           .           •           .  ,      .     132 

Caliban  on  Ariel  .           •           .           ,  ,           .133 

The  Weary  Wedding            .           ,           ,  .      ,     134 
The  Winds  .......     149 

A  Lyke-wake  Song                ,           ,           •  ,      ,     151 

A  Reiver's  Neck- Verse    .           •           «  •           •     153 

The  Witch-Mother    .           ♦           ,           ,  •      .     i55 

The  Bride's  Tragedy       •           •           •  •           •     160 

A  Jacobite's  Farewell         •           «           •  ,      ,    167 

A  Jacobite's  Exile           •           •           «  •           .169 

The  Tyneside  Widow           •           •           •  •      •    i75 

Dedication.           .           .          •          •  •           •    iSo 


MARCH:    AN  ODE. 
i88;. 

Ere  frost-flower  and  snow-blossom  faded  and  fell,  and 

the  splendour  of  winter  had  passed  out  of  sight, 
I'he  ways  of  the  woodlands  were  fairer  and  stranger  than 

dreams  that  fulfil  us  in  sleep  with  delight ; 
The  breath  of  the  mouths  of  the  winds  had  hardened  on 

tree-tops  and  branches  that  glittered  and  swayed 
Such  wonders  and  glories  of  blossomlike  snow  or  of  frosl 

that  outlightens  all  flowers  till  it  fade 
That  the  sea  was  not  lovelier  than  here  was  the  land,  nor 

the  night  than  the  day,  nor  the  day  than  the  night, 


2  MARCH:  AN  ODE 

Nor  the  winter  sublimer  with  storm  than  the  spring  :  such 
mirth  had  the  madness  and  might  in  thee  made, 

March,  master  of  winds,  bright  minstrel  and  marshal  of 
storms  that  enkindle  the  season  they  smite. 

If. 

And  now  that  the  rage  of  thy  rapture  is  satiate  with  revel 

and  ravin  and  spoil  of  the  snow, 
And  the  branches  it  brightened  are  broken,  and  shattered 

the  tree-tops  that  only  thy  wrath  could  lay  low. 
How  should  not  thy  lovers  rejoice  in  thee,  leader  and 

lord  of  the  year  that  exults  to  be  born 
So  strong  in  thy  strength  and  so  glad  of  thy  gladness  whose 

laughter  puts  winter  and  sorrow  to  scorn  ? 
Thou  hast  shaken  the  snows  from  thy  wings,  and  the  frost 

on  thy  forehead  is  molten  :  thy  lips  are  aglow 
As  a  lover's  that  kindle  with  kissing,  and  earth,  with  her 

raiment  and  tresses  yet  wasted  and  torn, 
Takes  breath  as  she  smiles  in  the  grasp  of  thy  passion  tc 

feel  through  her  spirit  the  sense  of  thee  flow. 


MARCH:  AN  ODE. 


III. 


Fain,  fain  would  we  see  but  again  for  an  hour  what  the 

wind  and  the  sun  have  dispelled  and  consumed, 
Those  full  deep  swan-soft  feathers  of  snow  with  whose 

luminous  burden  the  branches  implumed 
Hung  heavily,  curved  as  a  half-bent  bow,  and  fledged  not 

as  birds  are,  but  petalled  as  flowers. 
Each  tree-top  and   branchlet  a  pinnacle  jewelled  and 

carved,  or  a  fountain  that  shines  as  it  showers. 
But  fixed  as  a  fountain  is  fixed  not,  and  wrought  not  to 

last  till  by  time  or  by  tempest  entombed. 
As  a  pinnacle  carven  and  gilded  of  men  :  for  the  date  of 

its  doom  is  no  more  than  an  hour's, 
One  hour  of  the  sun's  when  the  warm  wind  wakes  him  to 

wither  the  snow-flowers  that  froze  as  they  bloomed. 

IV. 

As  the  sunshine  quenches  the  snowshine  ;  as  April  sub- 
dues thee,  and  yields  up  his  kingdom  to  May  ; 

B  2 


4  MARCH:  AN  ODE. 

So  time  overcomes  the  regret  that  is  born  of  delight  as 

it  passes  in  passion  away, 
And  leaves  but  a  dream  for  desire  to  rejoice  in  or  mourn 

for  with  tears  or  thanksgivings  ;  but  thou, 
Bright  god  that  art  gone  from  us,  maddest  and  gladdest 

of  months,  to  what  goal  hast  thou  gone  Irom  us  now  ? 
For  somewhere   surely  the  storm  of  thy  laughter  that 

lightens,  the  beat  of  thy  wings  that  play, 
Must  flame  as  a  fire  through  the  world,  and  the  heavens 

that  we  know  not  rejoice  in  thee  :  surely  thy  brow 
Hath  lost  not  its  radiance  of  empire,  thy  spirit  the  joy 

that  impelled  it  on  quest  as  for  prey. 

V. 

Are  thy  feet  on  the  ways  of  the  limitless  waters,  thy  wings 

on  the  winds  of  the  waste  north  sea  ? 
Are  the  fires  of  the  false  north  dawn  over  heavens  where 

summer  is  stormful  and  strong  like  thee 
Now  bright  in  the  sight  of  thine  eyes  ?  are  the  bastions 

of  icebergs  assailed  by  the  blast  of  thy  breath  ? 


MARCH:  AN  ODE.  5 

Is  it  March  with  the  wild  north  world  when  April  is 

waning  ?  the  word  that  the  changed  year  saith, 
Is  it  echoed  to  northward  with  rapture  of  passion  reiterate 

from  spirits  triumphant  as  we 
Wliose  hearts  were  uplift  at  the  blast  of  thy  clarions  as 

men's  rearisen  from  a  sleep  that  was  death 
And  kindled  to  life  that  was  one  with  the  world's  and  with 

thine  ?  hast  thou  set  not  the  whole  world  free  ? 

VI. 

For  the  breath  of  thy  lips  is  freedom,  and  freedom's  the 

sense  of  thy  spirit,  the  sound  of  thy  song, 
Glad  god  of  the  north-east  wind,  whose  heart  is  as  high 

as  the  hands  of  thy  kingdom  are  strong. 
Thy  kingdom  whose  empire  is  terror  and  joy,  twin-featured 

and  fruitful  of  births  divine. 
Days  lit  with  the  flame  of  the  lamps  of  the  flowers,  and 

nights  that  are  drunken  with  dew  for  wine, 
And  sleep  not  for  joy  of  the  stars  that  deepen  and  quicken, 

a  denser  and  fierier  throng. 


6  MARCH:  AN  ODE. 

And  the  world  that  thy  breath  bade  whiten  and  tremble 
rejoices  at  heart  as  they  strengthen  and  shine, 

And  earth  gives  thanks  for  the  glory  bequeathed  her,  and 
knows  of  thy  reign  that  it  wrought  not  wrong. 

VII. 

rhy  spirit  is  quenched  not,  albeit  we  behold  not  thy  face 

in  the  crown  of  the  steep  sky's  arch, 
And  the  bold  first  buds  of  the  whin  wax  golden,  and 

witness  arise  of  the  thorn  and  the  larch  : 
Wild  April,  enkindled  to  laughter  and  storm  by  the  kiss 

of  the  wildest  of  winds  that  blow. 
Calls  loud  on  his  brother  for  witness  \   his  hands  that 

were  laden  with  blossom  are  sprinkled  with  snow, 
And  his  lips  breathe  winter,  and  laugh,  and  relent ;  and 

the  live  woods  feel  not  the  frost's  flame  parch  ; 
For  the  flame  of  the  spring  that  consumes  not  but  quickens 

is  felt  at  the  heart  of  the  forest  aglow. 
And  the  sparks  that  enkindled  and  fed  it  were  strewn  from 

the  hands  of  the  gods  of  the  winds  of  March. 


THE  COMMONWEAL. 
1887. 


Eight  hundred  years  and  twenty-one 
Have  shone  and  sunken  since  the  land 
Whose  name  is  freedom  bore  such  brand 

As  marks  a  captive,  and  the  sun 
Beheld  her  fettered  hand. 

II. 

But  ere  dark  time  had  shed  as  rain 
Or  sown  on  sterile  earth  as  seed 
That  bears  no  fruit  save  tare  and  weed 

An  age  and  half  an  age  again, 
She  rose  on  Runnymede. 


THE  COMMONWEAL. 

HI. 

Out  of  the  shadow,  stadike  still, 
She  rose  up  radiant  in  her  right, 
And  spake,  and  put  to  fear  and  flight 

The  lawless  rule  of  awless  will 
That  pleads  no  right  save  might 

IV. 

Nor  since  hath  England  ever  borne 
The  burden  laid  on  subject  lands, 
The  rule  that  curbs  and  binds  all  hands 

Save  one,  and  marks  for  servile  scorn 
The  heads  it  bows  and  brands. 

V. 

A  commonweal  arrayed  and  crowned 
With  gold  and  purple,  girt  wdth  steel 
At  need,  that  foes  must  fear  or  feel, 

We  find  her,  as  our  fathers  found, 
Earth's  lordliest  commonweal. 


THE  COMMONWEAL.  | 

VI. 

And  now  that  fifty  years  are  flown 

Since  in  a  maiden's  hand  the  sign 

Of  empire  that  no  seas  confine 
First  as  a  star  to  seaward  shone, 

We  see  their  record  shine. 

VII. 

A  troubled  record,  foul  and  fair, 
A  simple  record  and  serene, 
Inscribes  for  praise  a  blameless  queen. 

For  praise  and  blame  an  age  of  care 
And  change  and  ends  unseen. 

VIII. 

Hope,  wide  of  eye  and  wild  of  wing, 

Rose  with  the  sundawn  of  a  reign 

Whose  grace  should  make  the  rough  ways  plain, 
And  fill  the  worn  old  world  with  spring, 

And  heal  its  heart  of  pairu 


to  THE  COMMONWEAL. 

IX. 

Peace  was  to  be  on  earth  ;  men's  hope 
Was  holier  than  their  fathers  had, 
Their  wisdom  not  more  wise  than  glad  : 

They  saw  the  gates  of  promise  ope, 
And  heard  what  love's  lips  bade, 

X. 

Love  armed  with  knowledge,  winged  and  wise, 
Should  hush  the  wind  of  war,  and  see, 
They  said,  the  sun  of  days  to  be 

Bring  round  beneath  serener  skies 
A  stormless  jubilee. 

XI. 

Time,  in  the  darkness  unbeholden 
That  hides  him  from  the  sight  of  fear 
And  lets  but  dreaming  hope  draw  near, 

Smiled  and  was  sad  to  hear  such  golden 
Strains  hail  the  all-golden  year. 


THE  COMMONWEAL.  ii 

XII. 

Strange  clouds  have  risen  between,  and  wild 
Red  stars  of  stomi  that  lit  the  abyss 
Wherein  fierce  fraud  and  violence  kiss 

And  mock  such  promise  as  beguiled 
The  fiftieth  year  from  this. 

XIII. 

War  upon  war,  change  after  change, 

Hath  shaken  thrones  and  towers  to  dust, 
And  hopes  austere  and  faiths  august 

Have  watched  in  patience  stern  and  strange 
Men's  works  unjust  and  just. 

XIV. 

As  from  some  Alpine  watch-tower's  portal 
Night,  living  yet,  looks  forth  for  dawn, 
So  from  time's  mistier  mountain  lawn 

The  spirit  of  man,  in  trust  immortal. 
Yearns  toward  a  hope  withdrawn. 


12  THE   COMMONWEAL. 

XV. 

The  morning  comes  not,  yet  the  night 

AVanes,  and  men's  eyes  win  strength  to  see 
AVTiere  twilight  is,  where  light  shall  be 

■>Vhen  conquered  wrong  and  conquering  right 
Acclaim  a  world  set  free. 

XVI. 

Calm  as  our  mother-land,  the  mother 
Of  faith  and  freedom,  pure  and  wise, 
Keeps  watch  beneath  unchangeful  skies, 

When  hath  she  watched  the  woes  of  other 
Strange  lands  with  alien  eyes  ? 

XVII. 

Calm  as  she  stands  alone,  what  nation 

Hath  lacked  an  alms  from  English  hands? 
What  exiles  from  what  stricken  lands 

Have  lacked  the  shelter  of  the  station 
Where  higher  than  all  she  stands  ? 


THE  COMMONWEAL.  ij 

XVIII. 

Though  time  discrown  and  change  dismantle 
The  pride  of  thrones  and  towers  that  frown, 
How  should  they  bring  her  glories  down — 

The  sea  cast  round  her  like  a  mantle. 
The  sea-cloud  like  a  crown  ? 

XIX. 

The  sea,  divine  as  heaven  and  deathless, 
Is  hers,  and  none  but  only  she 
Hath  learnt  the  sea's  word,  none  but  we 

Her  children  hear  in  heart  the  breathless 
Bright  watchword  of  the  sea. 

XX. 

Heard  not  of  others,  or  misheard 
Of  many  a  land  for  many  a  year, 
The  watchword  Freedom  fails  not  here 

Of  hearts  that  witness  if  the  word 
Find  faith  in  England's  ear. 


14  THE   COMMONWEAL. 

XXI. 

She,  first  to  love  the  h'ght,  and  daughter 
Incarnate  of  the  northern  dawn, 
She,  round  whose  feet  the  wild  waves  fawn 

When  all  their  wrath  of  warring  water 
Sounds  like  a  babe's  breath  drawn, 

XXII. 

How  should  not  she  best  know,  love  best. 
And  best  of  all  souls  understand 
The  very  soul  of  freedom,  scanned 

Far  off,  sought  out  in  darkling  quest 
By  men  at  heart  unmanned  ? 

XXIII. 

They  climb  and  fall,  ensnared,  enshrouded, 
By  mists  of  words  and  toils  they  set 
To  take  themselves,  till  fierce  regret 

Grows  mad  with  shame,  and  all  their  clouded 
Red  skies  hang  sunless  yet 


THE  COMMONWEAL.  15 

XXIV. 

But  us  the  sun,  not  wholly  risen 

Nor  equal  now  for  all,  illumes 

With  more  of  light  than  cloud  that  looms  ; 
Of  light  that  leads  forth  souls  from  prison 

And  breaks  the  seals  of  tombs. 

XXV. 

Did  not  her  breasts  who  reared  us  rear 

Him  who  took  heaven  in  hand,  and  weighed 
Bright  world  with  world  in  balance  laid  ? 

What  Newton's  might  could  make  not  clear 
Hath  Darwin's  might  not  made  ? 

XXVI. 

The  forces  of  the  dark  dissolve, 

The  doorways  of  the  dark  are  broken  : 
The  word  that  casts  out  night  is  spoken, 

And  whence  the  springs  of  things  evolve 
Light  born  of  night  bears  token. 


l6  THE  COMMONWEAL. 

XXVII. 

Slie,  loving  light  for  light's  sake  only, 
And  truth  for  only  truth's,  and  song 
For  song's  sake  and  the  sea's,  how  long 

Hath  she  not  borne  the  world  her  lonely 
Witness  of  ri#ht  and  wrong  ? 

XXVIII. 

From  light  to  light  her  eyes  imperial 
Turn,  and  require  the  further  light, 
More  perfect  than  the  sun's  in  sight, 

Till  star  and  sun  seem  all  funereal 
Lamps  of  the  vaulted  night 

XXIX. 

She  gazes  till  the  strenuous  soul 
Within  the  rapture  of  her  eyes 
Creates  or  bids  awake,  arise, 

The  light  she  looks  for,  pure  and  whole 
And  worshipped  of  the  wise. 


THE  COMMONWEAL.  17 

XXX. 

Such  sons  are  hers,  such  radiant  hands 
Have  borne  abroad  her  lamp  of  old, 
Such  mouths  of  honey-dropping  gold 

Have  sent  across  all  seas  and  lands 
Her  fame  as  music  rolled. 

XXXI. 

As  music  made  of  rolling  thunder 

That  hurls  through  heaven  its  heart  sublime. 
Its  heart  of  joy,  in  charging  chime. 

So  ring  the  songs  that  round  and  under 
Her  temple  surge  and  climb. 

XXXII. 

A  temple  not  by  men's  hands  builded, 
But  m.oulded  of  the  spirit,  and  wrought 
Of  passion  and  imperious  thought  ; 

With  light  beyond  all  sunlight  gilded, 
WTiereby  the  sun  seems  nought 
IIL  C 


l8  THE  COMMONWEAL. 

XXXIII. 

Thy  shrine,  our  mother,  seen  for  fairer 
'ITian  even  thy  natural  face,  made  fair 
With  kisses  of  thine  April  air 

Even  now,  when  spring  thy  banner-bearer 
Took  up  thy  sign  to  bear  ; 

XXXIV. 

Thine  annual  sign  from  heaven's  own  arch 
Given  of  the  sun's  hand  into  thine, 
To  rear  and  cheer  each  wildwood  shrine 

But  now  laid  waste  by  wild-winged  March, 
March,  mad  with  wind  like  wine. 

XXXV. 

From  all  thy  brightening  downs  whereon 
The  windy  seaward  whin-flower  shows 
Blossom  whose  pride  strikes  pale  the  rose 

P'orth  is  the  golden  watchword  gone 
Whereat  the  world's  face  glows. 


THE   COMMONWEAL.  iq 

XXXVl. 

Thy  quickening  woods  rejoice  and  ring 
Till  earth  seems  glorious  as  the  sea  : 
With  yearning  love  too  glad  for  glee 

The  world's  heart  quivers  toward  the  spring 
As  all  our  hearts  toward  thee. 

XXXVII. 

Thee,  mother,  thee,  our  queen,  who  givest 
Assurance  to  the  heavens  most  high 
And  earth  whereon  her  bondsmen  sigh 

That  by  the  sea's  grace  while  thou  livest 
Hope  shall  not  wholly  die. 

XXXVIII. 

That  while  thy  free  folk  hold  the  van 
Of  all  men,  and  the  sea- spray  shed 
As  dew  more  heavenly  on  thy  head 

Keeps  bright  thy  face  in  sight  of  man, 
Man's  pride  shall  drop  not  dead. 

c  a 


lo  THE  COMMONWEAL. 

XXXIX. 

A  pride  more  pure  than  humblest  prayer, 
More  wise  than  wisdom  born  of  doubt, 
Girds  for  thy  sake  men's  hearts  about 

With  trust  and  triumph  that  despair 
And  fear  may  cast  not  out. 

XL. 

Despair  may  wring  men's  hearts,  and  fear 
Bow  down  their  heads  to  kiss  the  dust, 
Where  patriot  memories  rot  and  rust, 

And  change  makes  faint  a  nation's  cheer, 
And  faith  yields  up  her  trust 

XLI. 

Not  here  this  year  have  true  men  known, 
Not  here  this  year  may  true  men  know. 
That  brand  of  shame-compelling  woe 

Which  bids  but  brave  men  shrink  or  groan 
And  lays  but  honour  low. 


THE  COMMONWEAL,  ai 

XLII. 

The  strong  spring  wind  blows  notes  of  praise, 
And  hallowing  pride  of  heart,  and  cheer 
Unchanging,  toward  all  true  men  here 

Who  hold  the  trust  of  ancient  days 
High  as  of  old  this  year. 

XLIII. 

The  days  that  made  thee  great  are  dead  ; 

The  days  that  now  must  keep  thee  great 

Lie  not  in  keeping  of  thy  fate  ; 
In  thine  they  lie,  whose  heart  and  head 

Sustain  thy  charge  of  state. 

XLIV. 

No  state  so  proud,  no  pride  so  just, 

The  sun,  through  clouds  at  sunrise  curled 
Or  clouds  across  the  sunset  whirled. 

Hath  sight  of,  nor  has  man  such  trust 
As  thine  in  all  the  world. 


ti  THE  COMMONWEAL. 

XLV. 

Each  hour  that  sees  the  sunset's  crest 
Make  bright  thy  shores  ere  day  decline 
Sees  dawn  the  sun  on  shores  of  thine. 

Sees  west  as  east  and  east  as  west 
On  thee  their  sovereign  shine, 

XLVI. 

The  sea's  own  heart  must  needs  wax  proud 
To  have  borne  the  world  a  child  like  thee. 
What  birth  of  earth  might  ever  be 

Thy  sister?    Time,  a  wandering  cloud. 
Is  sunshine  on  thy  sea, 

XLVII. 

Change  mars  not  her  ;  and  thee,  our  mother, 
Wliat  change  that  irks  or  moves  thee  mars  ? 
\Vliat  shock  that  shakes?  what  chance  that  jars? 

Time  gave  thee,  as  he  gave  none  other, 
A  station  like  a  star's. 


THE  COMMONWEAL.  23 

t 


XLVIII. 

The  storm  that  shrieks,  the  wind  that  wages 
War  with  the  wings  of  hopes  that  dimb 
Too  high  toward  heaven  in  doubt  sublime, 

Assail  not  thee,  approved  of  ages 
The  towering  crown  of  time. 

XLIX. 

Toward  thee  this  year  thy  children  turning 
With  souls  uplift  of  changeless  cheer 
Salute  with  love  that  casts  out  fear, 

With  hearts  for  beacons  round  thee  burning, 
The  token  of  this  year. 

L. 

With  just  and  sacred  jubilation 
Let  earth  sound  answer  to  the  sea 
For  witness,  blown  on  winds  as  free. 

How  England,  how  her  crowning  nation, 
Acclaims  this  jubilee. 


24 


THE  ARMADA, 
1588  :  1888. 

L 

L 

England,  mother  born  of  seamen,  daughter  fostered  oi 

the  sea, 
Mother  more  beloved  than  all  who  bear  not  all  their 
children  free. 
Reared  and  nursed  and  crowned  and  cherished  by  the 

sea-wind  and  the  sun, 
Sweetest  land  and  strongest,  face  most  fair  and  mighti- 
est heart  in  one. 
Stands  not  higher  than  when  the  centuries  known  of 
earth  were  less  by  three. 
When  the  strength  that  struck  the  whole  world  pale 
fell  back  from  hers  undone. 


THE  ARMADA.  2$ 

II. 

At  her  feet  were  the  heads  of  her  foes  bowed  down,  and 

the  strengths  of  the  storm  of  them  stayed, 
And  the  hearts  that  were  touched  not  with  mercy  with 

terror  were  touched  and  amazed  and  affray ed  : 
Yea,  hearts  that  had  never  been  molten  with  pity  were 

molten  with  fear  as  with  flame. 
And  the  priests  of  the  Godhead  whose  temple  is  hell, 

and  his  heart  is  of  iron  and  fire. 
And  the  swordsmen  that  served  and  the  seamen  that 

sped  them,  whom  peril  could  tame  not  or  tire. 
Were  as  foam  on  the  winds  of  the  waters  of  England 

which  tempest  can  tire  not  or  tame. 

They  were  girded  about  with  thunder,  and  lightning  came 

forth  of  the  rage  of  their  strength, 
And  the  measure  that  measures  the  wings  of  the  storm 

was  the  breadth  of  their  force  and  the  length  : 


26  THE  ARMADA. 

And  the  name  of  their  might  was  Invincible,  covered 

and  clothed  with  the  terror  of  God  ; 
With  his  wrath  were  they  winged,  with  his  love  were  they 

fired,  with  the  speed  of  his  winds  were  they  shod  ; 
With  his  soul  were  they  filled,  in  his  trust  were  they  com- 
forted :  grace  was  upon  them  as  night. 
And  faith  as  the  blackness  of  darkness  :  the  fume  of 

their  balefires  was  fair  in  his  sight, 
The   reek  of  them  sweet  as  a  savour  of  myrrh  in  his 

nostrils  :  the  world  that  he  made. 
Theirs  was  it  by  gift  of  his  ser\'ants  :  the  wind,  if  they 

spake  in  his  name,  was  afraid, 
And  the  sun  was  a  shadow  before  it,  the  stars  were 

astonished  with  fear  of  it :  fire 
Went  up  to  them,  fed  with  men  living,  and  lit  of  men's 

hands  for  a  shrine  or  a  pyre  ; 
And  the  east  and  the  west  wind  scattered  their  ashes 

abroad,  that  his  name  should  be  blest 
Of  the  tribes  of  the  chosen  whose  blessings  are  curses 

from  uttermost  east  unto  west 


THE  ARMADA,  tj 


L 

Hell  for  Spain,  and  heaven  for  England,— God  to  God, 

and  man  to  nian, — 
Met   confronted,  light  with  darkness,   life  with  death  : 
since  time  began, 
Never  earth  nor  sea  beheld  so  great  a  stake  before 

them  set, 
Save  when  Athens  hurled  back  Asia  from  the  lists 
wherein  they  met ; 
Never  since  the  sands  of  ages  through  the  glass  of  history 
ran 
Saw  the  sun  in  heaven  a  lordlier  day  than  this  that 
lights  us  yet 

IL 

For  the  light  that  abides  upon  England,  the  glory  that 
rests  on  her  godlike  name, 


28  THE  ARMADA, 

The  pride  that  is  love  and  the  love  that  is  faith,  a  perfume 

dissolved  in  flame, 
Took  fire  from  the  dawn  of  the  fierce  July  when  fleets 

were  scattered  as  foam 
And  squadrons  as  flakes  of  spray ;  when  galleon  and 

galliass  that  shadowed  the  sea 
Were  swept  from  her  waves  like  shadows  that  pass  with 

the  clouds  they  fell  from,  and  she 
Laughed  loud  to  the  wind  as  it  gave  to  her  keeping 

the  glories  of  Spain  and  Rome. 

III. 

Three  hundred  summers  have  fallen  as  leaves  by  the 
storms  in  their  season  thinned, 

Since  northward  the  war-ships  of  Spain  came  sheer  up 
the  way  of  the  south-west  wind : 

Where  the  citadel  cliffs  of  England  are  flanked  with  bas- 
tions of  serpentine, 

Far  off  to  the  windward  loomed  their  hulls,  an  hundred 
and  twenty-nine, 


THE  ARMADA,  19 

All  filled   full  of  the  war,  full-fraught  with  battle   and 

charged  with  bale ; 
Then  store-ships  weighted  with  cannon ;  and  all  were  an 

hundred  and  fifty  sail 
The  measureless  menace  of  darkness  anhungered  with 

hope  to  prevail  upon  light, 
The  shadow  of  death  made  substance,  the  present  and 

visible  spirit  of  night, 
Came,  shaped  as  a  waxing  or  waning  moon  that  rose 

with  the  fall  of  day. 
To  the  channel  where  couches  the  Lion  in  guard  of  the 

gate  of  the  lustrous  bay. 
Fair  England,  sweet  as  the  sea  that  shields  her,  and  pure 

as  the  sea  from  stain, 
Smiled,  hearing   hardly  for  scorn  that  stirred  her  the 

menace  of  saintly  Spam. 


30  THE  ARMADA 


III. 
I. 

*They  that  ride  over  ocean  wide  with  hempen  bridle  and 
horse  of  tree,' 

How  shall  they  in  the  darkening  day  of  wrath  and  an- 
guish and  fear  go  free  ? 

How  shall  these  that  have  curbed  the  seas  not  feel  his 
bridle  who  made  the  sea  ? 

God  shall  bow  them  and  break  them  now ;  for  what  is 

man  in  the  Lord  God's  sight  ? 
Fear  shall  shake  them,  and  shame  shall  break,  and  all 

the  noon  of  their  pride  be  night : 
These  that  sinned  shall  the  ravening  wind  of  doom  bring 

under,  and  judgment  smite. 

England  broke  from  her  neck  the  yoke,  and  rent  the 
fetter,  and  mocked  the  rod : 


THE  ARMADA.  jt 

Shrines  of  old  that  she  decked  with  gold  she  turned  to 

dust,  to  the  dust  she  trod  : 
What  is  she,  that  the  wind  and  sea  should  fight  beside 

her,  and  war  with  God  ? 

Lo,  the  cloud  of  his  ships  that  crowd  her  channel's  inlet 
with  storm  sublime, 

Darker  far  than  the  tempests  are  that  sweep  the  skies  of 
her  northmost  clime ; 

Huge  and  dense  as  the  walls  that  fence  the  secret  dark- 
ness of  unknown  time. 

Mast  on  mast  as  a  tower  goes  past,  and  sail  by  sail  as  a 

cloud's  wing  spread  ; 
Fleet  by  fleet,  as  the  throngs  whose  feet  keep  time  with 

death  in  his  dance  of  dread  ; 
Galleons  dark  as  the  helmsman's  bark  of  old  that  ferried 

to  hell  the  dead. 

Squadrons  proud  as  their  lords,  and  loud  with  tramp  of 
soldiers  and  chant  of  priests  ; 


32  THE  ARMADA. 

Slaves  there  told   by  the  thousandfold,  made  fast  in 

bondage  as  herded  beasts  ; 
Lords  and  slaves  that  the  sweet  free  waves  shall  feed  on, 

satiate  with  funeral  feasts. 

Nay,  not  so  shall  it  be,  they  know ;  their  priests  have  said 

it  ;  can  priesthood  lie? 
God  shall  keep  them,  their  God  shall  sleep  not  :  peril 

and  evil  shall  pass  them  by  : 
Nay,  for  these  are  his  children  ;  seas  and  winds  shall  bid 

not  his  children  die. 


IL 

So  they  boast  them,  the  monstrous  host  whose  menace 
mocks  at  the  dawn  :  and  here 

They  that  wait  at  the  wild  sea's  gate,  and  watch  the  dark- 
ness of  doom  draw  near. 

How  shall  they  in  their  evil  day  sustain  the  strength  of 
their  hearts  for  fear  ? 


THE  ARMADA  3^ 

Full  July  in  the  fervent  sky  sets  forth  her  twentieth  of 

changing  moms  : 
Winds  fall  mild  that  of  late  waxed  wild  :   no  presage 

whispers  or  wails  or  warns  : 
far  to  west  on  the  bland  sea's  breast  a  sailing  crescent 

uprears  her  horns. 

Seven  wide  miles  the  serene  sea  smiles  between  them 

stretching  from  rim  to  rim  : 
Soft  they  shine,  but  a  darker  sign  should  bid  not  hope  or 

belief  wax  dim  : 
God's  are  these  men,  and  not  the  sea's  :  their  trust  is  set 

not  on  her  but  him. 

God's  ?  but  who  is  the  God  whereto  the  prayers  and 

incense  of  these  men  rise  ? 
What  is  he,  that  the  wind  and  sea  should  fear  him,  quelled 

by  his  sunbright  eyes  ? 
What,  that  men  should  return  again,  and  hail  him  Lord 

of  the  servile  skies  ? 
III.  D 


V.  THE  ARMADA. 


j'> 


Hell's  own  flame  at  his  heavenly  name  leaps  higher  and 

laughs,  and  its  gulfs  rejoice  : 
Plague  and  death  from  his  baneful  breath  take  life  and 

lighten,  and  praise  his  choice  : 
Chosen  are  they  to  devour  for  prey  the  tribes  that  hear  not 

and  fear  his  voice. 

Ay,  but  we  that  the  wind  and  sea  gird  round  >nth  shelter 

of  storms  and  waves 
Know  not  him  that  ye  worship,  grim  as  dreams  that 

quicken  from  dead  men's  graves  : 
God  is  one  with  the  sea,  the  sun,  the  land  that  nursed  us, 

the  love  that  saves. 

Love  whose  heart  is  in  ours,  and  part  of  all  things  noble 

and  all  things  fair  ; 
Sweet  and  free  as  the  circling  sea,  sublime  and  kind  as 

the  fostering  air ; 
Pure  of  shame  as  is  England's  name,  whose  crowns  to 

come  are  as  crowns  that  were. 


THE  ARMADA.  35 


IV. 

But  the  Lord  of  darkness,  the  God  whose  love  is  a  flaming 

fire, 
The  master  whose  mercy  fulfils  wide  hell  till  its  torturers 

tire, 
He  shall  surely  have  heed  of  his  servants  who  serve  him 

for  love,  not  hire. 


They  shall  fetter  the  wing  of  the  wind  whose  pinions  are 

plumed  with  foam  : 
For  now  shall  thy  horn  be  exalted,  and  now  shall  thy 

bolt  strike  home  ; 

Yea,  now  shall  thy  kingdom  come,  Lord  God  of  the  priests 

of  Rome. 

HI 


36  THE  ARMADA, 

They  shall  cast  thy  curb  on  the  waters,  and  bridle  the 

waves  of  the  sea  : 
They  shall  say  to  her,  Peace,  be  still :  and  stillness  and 

peace  shall  be  : 
And  the  winds  and  the  storms  shall  hear  them,  and 

tremble,  and  worship  thee. 

Thy  breath  shall  darken  the  morning,  and  wither  the 

mounting  sun  ; 
And  the  daysprings,  frozen  and  fettered,  shall  know  thee, 

and  cease  to  run  ; 
The  heart  of  the  world  shall  feel  thee,  and  die,  and  thy 

will  be  done. 

The  spirit  of  man  that  would  sound  thee,  and  search  out 

causes  of  things. 
Shall  shrink  and  subside  and  praise  thee  :  and  wisdom, 

with  plume-plucked  wings, 
Shall  cower  at  thy  feet  and  confess  thee,  that  none  may 

fathom  thy  springs. 


THE  ARMADA.  37 

The  fountains  of  song  that  aNvait  but  the  wind  of  an  Apiil 

to  be 
To  burst  the  bonds  of  the  winter,  and  speak  with  the 

sound  of  a  sea, 
The  blast  of  thy  mouth  shall  quench  them  :  and  song 

shall  be  only  of  thee. 

The  days  that  are  dead  shall  quicken,  the  seasons  thai 

were  shall  return  ; 
And  the  streets  and  the  pastures  of  England,  the  woods 

that  burgeon  and  yearn. 
Shall  be  whitened  with  ashes  of  women  and  children  and 

men  that  bum. 

For  the  mother  shall  burn  with  the  babe  sprung  forth  of 

her  womb  in  fire. 
And  bride  with  bridegroom,  and  brother  with  sister,  and 

son  with  sire ; 
And  the  noise  of  the  flames  shall  be  sweet  in  thine  ears 

as  the  sound  of  a  lyre. 


3*  THE  ARMADA. 

Yea,  so  shall  thy  kingdom  be  stablished,  and  so  shall  the 

signs  of  it  be  : 
And  the  world  shall  know,  and  the  wind  shall  speak,  and 

the  sun  shall  see. 
That  these  are  the  works  of  thy  servants,  whose  worka 

bear  witness  to  thee. 

IL 

But  the  dusk  of  the  day  falls  fruitless,  whose  light  should 

have  lit  them  on  : 
Sails  flash  through  the  gloom  to  shoreward,  eclipsed  as 

the  sun  that  shone  : 
And  the  west  wind  wakes  with  dawn,  and  the  hope  that 

was  here  is  gone. 

Around  they  wheel  and  around,  two  knots  to  the  Spaniard's 

one. 
The  wind-swift  warriors  of  England,  who  shoot  as  with 

shafts  of  the  sun. 
With  fourfold  shots  for  the  Spaniard's,  that  spare  not  till 

day  be  done« 


THE  ARMADA.  y^ 

And  the  wind  with  the  sundown  sharpens,  and  hurtles  the 

ships  to  the  lee, 
And   Spaniard   on   Spaniard   sniites,   and  shatters,  and 

yields  ;  and  we. 
Ere  battle  begin,  stand  lords  of  the  battle,  acclaimed  of 

the  sea. 

And  the  day  sweeps  round  to  the  nightvsard  ;  and  heavy 

and  hard  the  waves 
Roll  in  on  the  herd  of  the  hurtling  galleons  ;  and  master? 

and  slaves 
Reel  blind  in  the  grasp  of  the  dark  strong  wind  that  shall 

dig  their  graves. 

For  the  sepulchres  hollowed  and  shaped  of  the  wind  in 

the  swerve  of  the  seas. 
The  graves  that  gape  for  their  pasture,  and  laugh,  thrilled 

through  by  the  breeze, 
The  sweet  soft   merciless  waters,  await  and  are  fain  of 

these 


40  THE  ARMADA. 

As  the  hiss  of  a  Python  heaving  in  menace  of  doom  to  be 
They  hear  through  the  clear  night  round  them,  whose 

hours  are  as  clouds  that  flee, 
The  whisper  of  tempest  sleeping,  the  heave  and  the  hiss 

of  the  sea. 


But  faith  is  theirs,  and  with  faith  are  they  girded  and 

helmed  and  shod  : 
Invincible  are  they,  almighty,  elect  for  a  sword  and  a 

rod ; 
Invincible  even  as  their  God  is  omnipotent,   infinite, 

God 

In  him  is  their  strength,  who  have  sworn  that  his  glory 

shall  wax  not  dim  : 
In  his  name  are  their  war-ships  hallowed  as  mightiest  of 

all  that  swim  : 
The  men  that  shall  cope  with  these,  and  conquer,  shall 

cast  out  him. 


THE  ARMADA.  41 

In  him  is  the  trust  of  their  hearts  j  the  desire  of  their  eyes 

is  he ; 
The  light  of  their  ways,  made  lightning  for  men  that 

would  fain  be  free  : 
Earth's  hosts  are  with  them,  and  with  them  is  heaven  : 

but  with  us  is  the  sea. 


V. 
I. 

And  a  day  and  a  night  pass  over  ; 

And  the  heart  of  their  chief  swells  high ; 
For  England,  the  warrior,  the  rover, 

Whose  banners  on  all  winds  fly. 
Soul-stricken,  he  saith,  by  the  shadow  of  death,  holds  off 
him,  and  draws  not  nigh. 

And  the  wind  and  the  dawn  together 
Make  in  from  the  gleaming  east : 


43  THE  ARMADA, 

And  fain  of  the  wild  glad  weather 
As  famine  is  fain  of  feast, 
And  fain  of  the  fight,  forth  sweeps  in  its  might  the  host 
of  the  Lord's  high  priest 


And  lightly  before  the  breeze 

The  ships  of  his  foes  take  wing  : 
Are  they  scattered,  the  lords  of  the  seas  ? 

Are  they  broken,  the  foes  of  the  king  ? 
And  ever  now  higher  as  a  mounting  fire  the  hopes  of  tiie 
Spaniard  spring. 


And  a  windless  night  comes  down  : 

And  a  breezeless  morning,  bright 
With  promise  of  praise  to  crown 

The  close  of  the  crowning  fight, 
Leaps  up  as  the  foe's  heart  leaps,  and  glows  with  lustrouii 
rapture  of  light. 


THE  ARMADA.  43 

And  stinted  of  gear  for  battle 

The  ships  of  the  sea's  folk  lie, 
Unwarlike,  herded  as  cattle, 

Six  miles  from  the  foeman's  eye 
That  fastens  as  flame  on  the  sight  of  them  tame  and 
oflenceless,  and  ranged  as  to  die. 

Surely  the  souls  in  them  quail, 

They  are  stricken  and  withered  at  heart, 
When  in  on  them,  sail  by  sail. 
Fierce  marvels  of  monstrous  art, 
Tower    darkening  on   tower  till    the  sea-winds   cower 
crowds  down  as  to  hurl  them  apart 

And  the  windless  weather  is  kindly, 

And  comforts  the  host  in  these  ; 
And  their  hearts  are  uphft  in  them  blindly, 

And  blindly  they  boast  at  ease 
That  the  next  day's  fight  shall  exalt  them,  and  smite  with 
destruction  the  lords  of  the  seas. 


44  THE  ARMADA, 

IL 

And  lightly  the  proud  hearts  prattle^ 

And  lightly  the  dawn  draws  nigh, 
The  dawn  of  the  doom  of  the  battle 

When  these  shall  falter  and  fly ; 
No  day  more  great  in  the  roll  of  fate  filled  ever  with  fire 
the  sky. 

To  fightward  they  go  as  to  feastward, 

And  the  tempest  of  ships  that  drive 
Sets  eastward  ever  and  eastward, 

Till  closer  they  strain  and  strive  ; 
And  the  shots  that  rain  on  the  hulls  of  Spain  are  as 
thunders  afire  and  alive. 

And  about  them  the  blithe  sea  smiles 

And  flashes  to  windward  and  lee 
Round  capes  and  headlands  and  isles 

That  heed  not  if  war  there  be  ; 
Round  Sark,  round  Wight,  green  jewels  of  light  in  the 
ring  of  the  golden  sea. 


THE  ARMADA.  4j 

But  the  men  that  within  them  abide 

Are  stout  of  spirit  and  stark 
As  rocks  that  repel  the  tide, 

As  day  that  repels  the  dark  ; 
And  the  light  bequeathed  from  their  swords  unsheathed 
shines  lineal  on  Wight  and  on  Sark. 

And  eastward  the  storm  sets  ever, 

The  storm  of  the  sails  that  strain 
And  follow  and  close  and  sever 

And  lose  and  return  and  gain  ; 
And  English  thunder  divides  in  sunder  the  holds  of  the 
ships  of  Spain. 

Southward  to  Calais,  appalled 
And  astonished,  the  vast  fleet  veers  ; 

And  the  skies  are  shrouded  and  palled. 
But  the  moonless  midnight  hears 
And  sees  how  swift  on  them  drive  and  drif:  strange  flarnw 

that  the  darkness  fears. 


<6  THE  ARMADA. 

They  fly  through  the  night  from  shoreward, 

Heart -stricken  till  morning  break, 
And  ever  to  scourge  them  forward 

Drives  down  on  them  England's  Drake, 
And  hurls  them  in  as  they  hurtle  and  spin  and  stagger, 
with  storm  to  wake. 


VL 
I. 

And  now  is  their  time  come  on  them.    For  eastward 

they  drift  and  reel. 
With  the  shallows  of  Flanders  ahead,  with  destruction 

and  havoc  at  heel, 
With  God  for  their  comfort  only,  the  God  whom 

they  serve  ;  and  here 
Their  Lord,  of  his  great  loving-kindness,  may  revel 

and  make  good  cheer  ; 


THE  ARMADA,  47 

Though  ever  his  lips  wax  thirstier  with  drinking,  and 
hotter  the  lusts  in  him  swell  ; 
For  he  feeds  the  thirst  that  consumes  him  with  blood, 
and  his  winepress  fumes  with  the  reek  of  helL 

II. 

Fierce  noon  beats  hard  on  the  battle  ;  the  galleons 
that  loom  to  the  lee 

Bow  down,  heel  over,  uplifting  their  shelterless  hulls 
from  the  sea  : 

P'rom  scuppers  aspirt  with  blood,  from  guns  dis- 
mounted and  dumb, 

Tlie  signs  of  the  doom  they  looked  for,  the  loud 
mute  witnesses  come. 
They  press  with  sunset  to  seaward  for  comfort  :  and 
shall  not  they  find  it  there  ? 
O  servants  of  God  most  high,  shall  his  winds  not  pass  you 
by,  and  his  waves  not  spare  ? 


4Z  THE  ARMADA, 


IXL 

The  wings  of  the  south-west  wind  are  widened ;  the 

breath  of  his  fervent  lips, 
More  keen  than  a  sword's  ed^e,  fiercer  than  fire,  falls  full 

on  the  plunging  ships. 
The  pilot  is  he  of  their  northward  flight,  their  stay  and 

their  steersman  he  ; 
A.  helmsman  clothed  with  the  tempest,  and  girdled  with 

strength  to  constrain  the  sea. 
And  the  host  of  them  trembles  and  quails,  caught  fast  m 

his  hand  as  a  bird  in  the  toils  ; 
For  the  wrath  and  the  joy  that  fulfil  him  are  mightier 

than  man's,  whom  he  slays  and  spoils. 
And  vainly,  with  heart  divided  in  sunder,  and  labour  of 

wavering  will, 
The  lord  of  their  host  takes  counsel  with  hope  if  haply 

their  star  shine  still, 


THE  ARMADA.  49 

If  haply  some  light  be  left  them  of  chance  to  renew  and 

redeem  the  fray  ; 
But  the  will  of  the  black  south-wester  is  lord  of  the 

councils  of  war  to-day. 
One  only  spirit  it  quells  not,  a  splendour  undarkened  of 

chance  or  time ; 
Be  the  praise  of  his  foes  with  Oquendo  for  ever,  a  name 

as  a  star  sublime. 
But  here  what  aid  in  a  hero's  heart,  what  help  in  his  hand 

may  be? 
For  ever  the  dark  wind  whitens  and  blackens  the  hollows 

and  heights  of  the  sea, 
And  galley  by  galley,  divided  and  desolate,  founders  ;  and 

none  takes  heed, 
Nor  foe  nor  friend,  if  they  perish  ;  forlorn,  cast  off  in 

their  uttermost  need, 
They  sink  in  the  whelm  of  the  waters,  as  pebbles  Ly 

children  from  shoreward  hurled, 
In  the  North  Sea's  waters  that  end  not,  nor  know  they  a 

bourn  but  the  bourn  of  the  world. 

IIL  S 


50  THE  ARMADA, 

Past  many  a  secure  unavailable  harbour,  and  many  a  loud 

stream's  mouth, 
Past  Humber  and  Tees  and  Tyne  and  Tweed,  they  fly, 

scourged  on  from  the  south, 
And  torn  by  the  scourge  of  the  storm-wind  that  smites 

as  a  harper  smites  on  a  lyre. 
And  consumed  of  the  storm  as  the  sacrifice  loved  of  their 

God  is  consumed  with  fire, 
And  devoured  of  the  darkness  as  men  that  are  slain  in 

the  fires  of  his  love  are  devoured. 
And  deflowered  of  their  lives  by  the  storms,  as  by  priests 

is  the  spirit  of  life  deflowered. 
For  the  wind,  of  its  godlike   mercy,  relents   not,  and 

hounds  them  ahead  to  the  north, 
With  English  hunters  at  heel,  till  now  is  the  herd  of  them 

past  the  Forth, 
All  huddled  and  hurtled  seaward ;  and  now  need  none 

wage  war  upon  these, 
Nor  huntsmen  follow  the  quarry  whose  fall  is  the  pastime 

sought  of  the  seas. 


THE  ARMADA.  51 

Day  upon  day  upon  day  confounds  them,  with  measure- 
less mists  that  swell, 

With  drift  of  rains  everlasting  and  dense  as  the  fumes  of 
ascending  hell. 

The  visions   of  priest  and   of  prophet    beholding  his 
enemies  bruised  of  his  rod 

Beheld  but  the  likeness  of  this  that  is  fallen  on  the  faith- 
ful, the  friends  of  God. 

Northward,  and  northward,  and  northward  they  stagger 
and  shudder  and  swerve  and  flit. 

Dismantled  of  masts  and  of  yards,  with  sails  by  the  fangs 
of  the  storm-wind  split. 

But  north  of  the  headland  whose  name  is  Wrath,  by  the 
wrath  or  the  ruth  of  the  sea, 

They  are  swept  or  sustained  to  the  westward,  and  drive 
through  the  rollers  aloof  to  the  lee. 

Some  strive  yet  northward  for  Iceland,  and  perish  :  but 
some  through  the  storm-hewn  straits 

That  sunder  the  Shetlands  and  Orkneys  are  borne  of  the 
breath  which  is  God's  or  fate's  ; 

«9 


51  THE  ARMADA. 

And  some,  by  the  dawn  of  September,  at  last  give  thanks 

as  for  stars  that  smile, 
For  the  winds  have  swept  them  to  shelter  and  sight  of 

the  cliffs  of  a  Catholic  isle. 
Though  many  the  fierce  rocks  feed  on,  and  many  the 

merciless  heretic  slays. 
Yet  some  that  have  laboured  to  land  with  their  treasure 

are  trustful,  and  give  God  praise. 
And  the  kernes  of  murderous  Ireland,  athirst  with  a  greed 

everlasting  of  blood, 
Unslakable  ever  with  slaughter  and  spoil,  rage  down  as  a 

ravening  flood, 
To  slay  and  to  flay  of  their  shining  apparel  their  brethren 

whom  ship^vreck  spares  \ 
Such  faith  and  such  mercy,  such  love  and  such  manhood, 

such  hands  and  such  hearts  are  theirs. 
Short  shrift  to  her  foes  gives  England,  but  shorter  doth 

Ireland  to  friends  ;  and  worse 
Fare  they  that  came  with  a  blessing  on  treason  than  they 

that  come  with  a  curse. 


THE  ARMADA,  $3 

Hacked,  harried,  and  mangled  of  axes  and  skenes,  three 

thousand  naked  and  dead 
Bear  witness  of  CathoHc  Ireland,  what  sons  of  what  sires 

at  her  breasts  are  bred. 
Winds  are  pitiful,  waves  are  merciful,  tempest  and  storm 

are  kind  : 
The  waters   that   smite   may  spare,  and  the  thunder  is 

deaf,  and  the  lightning  is  blind  : 
Of  these  perchance  at  his  need  may  a  man,  though  they 

know  it  not,  yet  find  grace  ; 
But  grace,  if  another  be  hardened  against  him,  he  gets 

not  at  this  man's  face. 
For  his  ear  that  hears  and  his  eye  that  sees  the  wreck  and 

the  wail  of  men. 
And  his  heart  that  relents  not  within  him,  but  hungers, 

are  hke  as  the  wolf's  in  his  den. 
Worthy  are  these  to  worship  their  master,  the  murderous 

Lord  of  lies. 
Who  hath  given  to  the  pontiff  his  servant  the  keys  of  the 

pit  and  the  keys  of  the  skies. 


54  THE  ARMADA. 

^Vild  famine  and  red-shod  rapine  are  cruel,  and  bitter 

with  blood  are  their  feasts  ; 
But  fiercer  than  famine  and  redder  than  rapine  the  hands 

and  the  hearts  of  priests. 
God,  God  bade  these  to  the  battle  ;   and  here,  on  a  land 

by  his  servants  trod, 
They  perish,  a  lordly   blood-offering,  subdued   by  the 

hands  of  the  servants  of  God. 
These  also  were  fed  of  his  priests  with  faith,  with  the 

milk  of  his  word  and  the  wine  ; 
These  too  are  fulfilled  with  the  spirit  of  darkness  thai^ 

guided  their  quest  divine. 
And  here,  cast  up  from  the  ravening  sea  on  the  mild 

land's  merciful  breast, 
This  comfort  they  find  of  their  fellows  in  worship  \  this 

guerdon  is  theirs  of  their  quest. 
Death  was  captain,  and  doom  was  pilot,  and  darkness  the 

chart  of  their  way  ; 
Night  and  hell  had  in  charge  and  in  keeping  the  host  of 

the  foes  of  day. 


THE  ARMADA.  55 

Invincible,  vanquished,  impregnable,  shattered,  a  si^n  to 

her  foes  of  fear, 
A  sign  to  the  world  and  the  stars  of  laughter,  the  fleet  of 

the  Lord  lies  here. 
Nay,  for  none  may  declare  the  place  of  the  ruin  wherein 

she  lies  ; 
Nay,  for  none  hath  beholden  the  grave  whence  never  a 

ghost  shall  rise. 
The  fleet  of  the  foemen  of  England  hath  found  not  one 

but  a  thousand  graves  ; 
And  he  that  shall  number  and  name  them  shall  number 

by  name  and  by  tale  the  waves. 

VIL 
I. 

Sixtus,  Pope  of  the  Church  whose  hope  takes  flight  for 

heaven  to  dethrone  the  sun, 
Philip,    king  that  wouldst    turn    our    spring   to  winter, 

blasted,  appalled,  undone, 
Prince  and  priest,  let  a  mourner's  feast  give  thanks  to 

God  for  your  conquest  won. 


56  THE  ARMADA. 

England's  heel  is  upon  you  :  kneel,  O  priest,  O  prince,  in 
the  dust,  and  cry, 

*  Lord,  why  thus  ?  art  thou  wroth  with   us  whose  faith 

was  great  in  thee,  God  most  high  ? 
Whence  is  this,  that  the  serpent's  hiss  derides  us  ?   Lord, 
can  thy  pledged  word  lie  ? 

*  God  of  hell,  are  its  flames  that  swell  quenched  now  for 

ever,  extinct  and  dead  ? 
Who  shall  fear  thee?   or  who  shall  hear  the  word  thy 

servants  who  feared  thee  said  ? 
Lord,  art  thou  as  the  dead  gods   now,  whose  arm  is 

shortened,  whose  rede  is  read  ? 

*Yet  we  thought  it  was  not  for  nought  thy  word  was 

given  us,  to  guard  and  guide  : 
Yet  we  deemed  that  they  had  not  dreamed  who  put  their 

trust  in  thee.     Hast  thou  lied  ? 
God  our  Lord,  was  the  sacred  sword  we  drew  not  drawn 

on  thy  Qiurch's  side  ? 


THE  ARMADA.  57 

*  England  hates  thee  as  hell's  own  gates  ;  and  England 

triumphs,  and  Rome  bows  down  : 
England  mocks  at  thee  ;   England's  rocks  cast  off  thy 

servants  to  drive  and  drown  : 
England  loathes  thee ;  and  fame  betroths  and  plights 

with  England  her  faith  for  crown. 

*  Spain  clings  fast  to  thee ;  Spain,  aghast  with  anguish, 

cries  to  thee  ;  where  art  thou  ? 
Spain   puts  trust  in  thee ;   lo,  the  dust   that   soils   and 

darkens  her  prostrate  brow  ! 
Spain  is  true  to  thy  senice  \  who  shall  raise  up  Spain  for 

thy  service  now  ? 

*  Who  shall  praise  thee,  if  none  may  raise  thy  servants 

up,  nor  affright  thy  foes  ? 

Winter  wanes,  and  the  woods  and  plains  forget  the  like- 
ness of  storms  and  snows  : 

So  shall  fear  of  thee  fade  even  here :  and  what  shall 
fallow  thee  no  man  knows.* 


58  THE  ARM  A  DA. 

Lords  of  night,  who  would  breathe  your  blight  on  April's 
morning  and  August's  noon, 

God  your  Lord,  the  condemned,  the  abhorred,  sinks  hell- 
ward,  smitten  with  deathlike  swoon  : 

Death's  own  dart  in  his  hateful  heart  now  thrills,  and 
night  shall  receive  him  soon. 

God  the  Devil,  thy  reign  of  revel  is  here  for  ever  eclipsed 

and  fled  : 
God  the  Liar,  everlasting  fire  lays  hold  at  last  on  thee, 

hand  and  head  : 
God  the  Accurst,  the  consuming  thirst  that  burns  thee 

never  shall  here  be  fed. 

IL 

England,  queen  of  the  waves  whose  green  inviolate  girdle 

enrings  thee  round. 
Mother  fair  as  the  morning,  where  is  now  the  place  of  thy 

foemen  found? 
Still  the  sea  that  salutes  us  free  proclaims  them  stricken, 

acclaims  thee  crowned. 


THE  ARMADA.  59 

Times  may  change,  and  the  skies  grow  strange  with  signs 

of  treason  and  fraud  and  fear  : 
Foes  in  union  of  strange  communion  may  rise  against 

thee  from  far  and  near  : 
Sloth  and  greed  on  thy  strength  may  feed  as  cankers 

waxing  from  year  to  year. 

Yet,  though  treason  and  fierce  unreason  should  league 

and  lie  and  defame  and  smite, 
We  that  know  thee,  how  far  below  thee  the  hatred  burns 

of  the  sons  of  night. 
We  that  love  thee,  behold  above  thee  the  witness  written 

of  life  in  light 

Life  that  shines  from  thee  shows  forth  signs  that  none 

may  read  not  but  eyeless  foes  : 
Hate,  bom  blind,  in  his  abject  mind  grows  hopeful  now 

but  as  madness  grows  : 
Love,  bom  wise,  with  exultant   eyes   adores   thy  glory, 

beholds  and  glows. 


6o  THE  ARMADA. 

Truth  is  in  thee,  and  none  may  win  thee  to  lie,  forsaking 

the  face  of  truth  : 
Freedom  lives  by  the  grace  she  gives  thee,  born  again 

from  thy  deathless  youth  : 
Faith  should  fail,  and  the  world  turn  pale,  wert  thou  the 

prey  of  the  serpent's  tooth. 

Greed  and  fraud,  unabashed,  unawed,  may  strive  to  sting 

thee  at  heel  in  vain  : 
Craft  and  fear  and  mistrust  may  leer  and  mourn  and 

murmur  and  plead  and  plain  : 
Thou  art  thou  :   and   thy  sunbright   brow  is  hers  that 

blasted  the  strength  of  Spain. 

Mother,  mother  beloved,  none  other  could  claim  in  place 

of  thee  England's  place  : 
Earth  bears  none  that  beholds  the  sun  so  pure  of  record, 

so  clothed  with  grace  : 
Dear  our  mother,  nor  son  nor  brother  is  thine,  as  strong 

or  as  fair  of  face. 


THE  ARMADA.  6t 

How  shalt  thou  be  abased  ?  or  how  shall  feai  take  hold 

of  thy  heart  ?  of  thine, 
England,  maiden  immortal,  laden  with  charge  of  life  and 

with  hopes  divine? 
Earth  shall  wither,  when  eyes  turned  hither  behold  not 

light  in  her  darkness  shine. 

England,  none  that  is  born  thy  son,  and  lives,  by  grace 

of  thy  glory,  free. 
Lives  and  yearns  not  at  heart  and  burns  with  hope  to 

serve  as  he  worships  thee  ; 
None  may  sing  thee  :  the  sea-wind's  wing  beats  down  our 

songs  as  it  hails  the  sea. 


62 


TO  A   SEAMEW. 

When  I  had  wings,  my  brother. 
Such  wings  were  mine  as  thine  ; 

Such  hfe  my  heart  remembers 

In  all  as  wild  Septembers 

As  this  when  life  seems  other, 

Though  sweet,  than  once  was  mine; 

When  I  had  wings,  my  brother. 
Such  wings  were  mine  as  thine. 


Such  life  as  thrills  and  quickens 

The  silence  of  thy  flight, 
Or  fills  thy  note's  elation 
With  lordlier  exultation 


TO  A   SEA  MEW,  63 

Than  man's,  whose  faint  heart  sickens 

With  hopes  and  fears  that  blight 
Such  life  as  thrills  and  quickens 

The  silence  of  thy  flight. 


Thy  cry  from  windward  clanging 
Makes  all  the  cliffs  rejoice ; 

Though  storm  clothe  seas  with  sorrow, 

Thy  call  salutes  the  morrow  ; 

While  shades  of  pain  seem  hanging 
Round  earth's  most  rapturous  voice, 

Thy  cry  from  windward  clanging 
Makes  all  the  cliffs  rejoice. 


We,  sons  and  sires  of  seamen, 

Whose  home  is  all  the  sea, 
What  place  man  may,  we  claim  it ; 
But  thine — whose  thought  may  name  it? 


64  TO  A  SEAMEW. 

Free  birds  live  higher  than  freemen, 
And  gladlier  ye  than  we — 

We,  sons  and  sires  of  seamen, 
Whose  home  is  all  the  sea. 


For  you  the  storm  sounds  only 
More  notes  of  more  delight 

Than  earth's  in  sunniest  weather; 

When  heaven  and  sea  together 

Join  strengths  against  the  lonely 
Lost  bark  borne  down  by  night, 

For  you  the  storm  sounds  only 
More  notes  of  more  delight 


With  wider  wing,  and  louder 

Long  clarion-call  of  joy, 
Thy  tribe  salutes  the  terror 
Of  darkness,  wild  as  error, 


TO  A   SEAMEW.  6« 

But  sure  as  truth,  and  prouder 

Than  waves  with  man  for  toy  ; 
With  wider  wing,  and  louder 

Long  clarion-call  of  joy. 


The  wave's  wing  spreads  and  flutters, 
The  wave's  heart  swells  and  breaks  ; 

One  moment's  passion  thrills  it, 

One  pulse  of  power  fulfils  it 

And  ends  the  pride  it  utters 

When,  loud  with  hfe  that  quakes, 

The  wave's  wing  spreads  and  flutters, 
The  wave's  heart  swells  and  breaks. 


But  thine  and  thou,  my  brother, 

Keep  heart  and  wing  more  high 
Than  aught  may  scare  or  sunder ; 
The  waves  whose  throats  are  thunder 
III. 


66  TO  A   SEA  ME  IV. 

Fall  hurtling  each  on  other, 
And  triumph  as  they  die  ; 

But  thine  and  thou,  my  brother, 
Keep  heart  and  wing  more  hi^h. 


More  high  than  wrath  or  anguish. 
More  strong  than  pride  or  fear, 

The  sense  or  soul  half  hidden 

In  thee,  for  us  forbidden, 

Bids  thee  nor  change  nor  languish. 
But  live  thy  life  as  here, 

More  high  than  wrath  or  anguish, 
More  strong  than  pride  or  fear. 


We  are  fallen,  even  we,  whose  passion 

On  earth  is  nearest  thine ; 
Who  sing,  and  cease  from  flying ; 
Who  live,  and  dream  of  dying  : 


TO  A   SEA  MEW.  67 

Grey  time,  in  time's  grey  fashion, 

Bids  wingless  creatures  pine  : 
We  are  fallen,  even  we,  whose  passion 

On  earth  is  nearest  thine. 


The  lark  knows  no  such  rapture, 

Such  joy  no  nightingale, 
As  sways  the  songless  measure 
Wherein  thy  wings  take  pleasure  : 
Thy  love  may  no  man  capture, 

Thy  pride  may  no  man  quail ; 
The  lark  knows  no  such  rapture. 
Such  joy  no  nightingale. 


And  we,  whom  dreams  embolden. 

We  can  but  creep  and  sing 
And  watch  through  heaven's  waste  hollow 
^  The  flight  no  sight  may  follow 


F  2 


6«  TO  A   SEAMEW. 

To  the  utter  bourne  beholden 

* 

Of  none  that  lack  thy  wing  : 

And  we,  whom  dre^n>s  embolden, 

We  can  but  creep  and  sing. 


Our  dreams  have  wings  that  falter  , 
Our  hearts  bear  hopes  that  die ; 

For  thee  no  dream  could  better 

A  life  no  fears  may  fetter, 

A  pride  no  care  can  alter, 
That  wots  not  whence  or  why 

Our  dreams  have  wings  that  falter, 
Our  hearts  bear  hopes  that  die. 


With  joy  more  fierce  and  sweeter 

Than  joys  we  deem  divine 
Their  lives,  by  time  untarnished. 
Are  girt  about  and  garnished. 


TO  A   SEAMEW.  69 

WTio  match  the  wave's  full  metre 

And  drink  the  wind's  wild  wine 
With  joy  more  fierce  and  sweeter 

Than  joys  we  deem  divine. 


Ah,  well  were  I  for  ever, 

Wouldst  thou  change  lives  with  me, 
And  take  my  song's  wild  honey, 
And  give  me  back  thy  sunny 
Wide  eyes  that  weary  never, 

And  wings  that  search  the  sea ; 
Ah,  well  were  I  for  ever, 

Wouldst  thou  change  lives  with  me. 

Beachy  Head,  September,  1886. 


70 


TAN  AND   THALASSIUS. 

A  LYRICAL   IDYl. 

thalassius. 
Pan! 

PAN. 

O  sea-Stray,  seed  of  Apollo, 

What  word  wouldst  thou  have  with  me.  ? 
My  ways  thou  wast  fain  to  follow 

Or  ever  the  years  hailed  thee 
Man. 

Now 
If  August  brood  on  the  valleys. 
If  satyrs  laugh  on  the  lawns, 
What  part  in  the  wildwood  alleys 
Hast  thou  with  the  fleet -foot  fauns — 
Thou? 


PAN  AND   THALASSIUS.  71 

See! 
Thy  feet  are  a  man's — not  cloven 
Like  these,  not  light  as  a  boy's  : 
The  tresses  and  tendrils  inwoven 
That  lure  us,  the  lure  of  them  cloys 
Thee. 

Us 

The  joy  of  the  wild  woods  never 

Leaves  free  of  the  thirst  it  slakes : 
The  wild  love  throbs  in  us  ever 

That  burns  in  the  dense  hot  brakes 

Thus. 

Life, 

■J 
Eternal,  passionate,  awless, 

Insatiable,  mutable,  dear, 

Makes  all  men's  law  for  us  lawless  : 

We  strive  not :  how  should  we  fear 

Strife? 


72  PAN  AND   THALASSIUS. 

.       We, 

The  birds  and  the  bright  winds  know  not 
Such  joys  as  are  ours  in  the  mild 

Warm  woodland ;  joys  such  as  grow  not 
In  waste  green  fields  of  the  wild 
Sea. 

No; 
Long  since,  in  the  world's  wind  veerinf^ 

Thy  heart  was  estranged  from  me  : 
Sweet  Echo  shall  yield  thee  not  hearing  ; 
What  have  we  to  do  with  thee  ? 
Go. 

THALASSIUS. 

Ay! 
Such  wrath  on  thy  nostril  quivers 

As  once  in  Sicilian  heat 
Bade  herdsmen  quail,  and  the  rivers 
Shrank,  leaving  a  path  for  thy  feet 
Dry? 


PAN  AND   THALASSIUS,  73 

Nay,  ^ 

Low  down  in  the  hot  soft  hollow 

Too  snakelike  hisses  thy  spleen  : 
*  O  sea-stray,  seed  of  Apollo  ! ' 
What  ill  hast  thou  heard  or  seen  ? 
Say. 

Man 
Knows  well,  if  he  hears  beside  him 
The  snarl  of  thy  wrath  at  noon, 
What  evil  may  soon  betide  him, 
Or  late,  if  thou  smite  not  soon, 
Pan. 

Me 
The  sound  of  thy  flute,  that  flatters 

The  woods  as  they  smile  and  sigh. 
Charmed  fast  as  it  charms  thy  satyrs, 
Can  charm  no  faster  than  I 
Thee. 


74  PAN  AND   THALASSIUS, 

Fast 
Thy  music  may  charm  the  splendid 

Wide  woodland  silence  to  sleep 
With  sounds  and  dreams  of  thee  blended 
And  whispers  of  waters  that  creep 
Past 

Here 
The  spell  of  thee  breathes  and  passes 

And  bids  the  heart  in  me  pause, 
Hushed  soft  as  the  leaves  and  the  grasses 
Are  hushed  if  the  storm's  foot  draws 
Near. 

Yet 
The  panic  that  strikes  down  strangers 

Transgressing  thy  ways  unaware 
Affrights  not  me  nor  endangers 
Through  dread  of  thy  secret  snare 
Set. 


PAN  AND   THALASSIUS,  75 

PAN. 

Wlience 
May  man  find  heart  to  deride  me? 

Who  made  his  face  as  a  star 
To  shine  as  a  God's  beside  me  ? 
Nay,  get  thee  away  from  us,  lor 
Hence. 

THALASSIUS. 

Then 
Shall  no  man's  heart,  as  he  raises 

A  hymn  to  thy  secret  head, 
Wax  great  with  the  godhead  he  praises : 
Thou,  God,  shalt  be  like  unto  dead 
Men. 

PAN. 

Grace 
I  take  not  of  men's  thanksgiving, 
I  crave  not  of  lips  that  live  ; 


76  PAN  AND   THALASSIUS. 

They  die,  and  behold,  I  am  living, 
While  they  and  their  dead  Gods  give 
Place. 


THALASSIUS. 

Yea: 
Too  lightly  the  words  were  spoken 

That  mourned  or  mocked  at  thee  dead : 
But  whose  was  the  word,  the  token, 
The  song  that  answered  and  said 
Nay? 

PAN. 

^Vhose 
But  mine,  in  the  midnight  hidden, 

Clothed  round  with  the  strength  of  night 
And  mysteries  of  things  forbidden 
For  all  but  the  one  most  bright 
Muse  ? 


PAN  AND   THALASSIUS.  ri 

THALASSIUS. 

Hers 
Or  thine,  O  Pan,  was  the  token 

That  gave  back  empire  to  thee 
Wlien  power  in  thy  hands  lay  brokea 
As  reeds  that  quake  if  a  bee 
Stirs  ? 

PAN. 

Whom 
Have  I  in  my  wide  woods  need  of  ? 

Urania's  limitless  eyes 
Behold  not  mine  end,  though  they  read  of 
A  word  that  shall  speak  to  the  skies 
Doom. 

THALASSIUS. 

She 
Gave  back  to  thee  kingdom  and  glory. 
And  grace  that  was  thine  of  yore, 


78  PAN  AND   THALASSIUS, 

And  life  to  thy  leaves,  late  hoary 
As  weeds  cast  up  from  the  hoar 
Sea. 

Song 
Can  bid  faith  shine  as  the  morning 

Though  light  in  the  world  be  none ; 
Death  shrinks  if  her  tongue  sound  warning, 
Night  quails,  and  beholds  the  sun 
Strong. 

PAN. 

Night 
Bare  rule  over  men  for  ages 

AVhose  worship  wist  not  of  me 
And  gat  but  sorrows  for  wages, 
And  hardly  for  tears  could  see 
Light 

Call 
No  more  on  the  starry  presence 

Whose  light  through  the  long  dark  swam : 


PAN  AND   THALASSIUS,  79 

Hold  fast  to  the  green  world's  pleaiance : 
For  I  that  am  lord  of  it  am 
AIL 

THALASSIUS, 

God, 
God  Pan,  from  the  glad  wood's  portal 

The  breaths  of  thy  song  blow  sweet : 
But  woods  may  be  walked  in  of  mortal 
Man's  thought,  where  never  thy  feet 
Trod. 

Thine 
All  secrets  of  growth  and  of  birth  are, 

All  glories  of  flower  and  of  tree, 
Wheresoever  the  wonders  of  earth  are  ; 
The  words  of  the  spell  of  the  sea 
Mine. 


8o 


A    BALL.4D  OF  BATH. 

Like  a  queen  enchanted  who  may  not  laugh  or  weep, 
Glad  at  heart  and  guarded  from  change  and  care  like 
ours, 
Girt  about  with  beauty  by  days  and  nights  that  creep 
Soft  as  breathless  ripples  that  softly  shoreward  sweep, 
Lies  the  lovely  city  whose  grace  no  grief  deflowers. 
Age  and  grey  forgetfulness,  time  that  shifts  and  veers, 
Touch    not    thee,   our    fairest,   whose  charm   no  rival 
nears, 
Hailed  as  England's  Florence  of  one  whose  praise  gives 
grace, 

ft 

L  an  dor,  once  thy  lover,  a  name  that  love  reveres : 
Dawn  and  noon  and  sunset  are  one  before  thy  face. 


A   BALLAD  OF  BATH,  8l 

Dawn  wheieof  we  know  not,  and  noon  whose  fruit  we 
reap, 
Garnered  up  in  record  of  years  that  fell  like  flowers, 
Sunset  liker  sunrise  along  the  shining  steep 
"Whence  thy  fair  face  lightens,  and  where  thy  soft  springs 
leap. 
Crown  at  once  and  gird  thee  with  grace  of  guardian 
powers. 
Loved  of  men  beloved  of  us,  souls  that  fame  inspheres. 
All  thine  air  hath  music  for  him  who  dreams  and  hears  ; 
Voices  mixed  of  multitudes,  feet  of  friends  that  pace, 
Witness  why  for  ever,  if  heaven's  face  clouds  or  clears, 
Dawn  and  noon  and  sunset  are  one  before  thy  face. 

Peace  hath  here  found  harbourage  mild  as  very  sleep  : 
Not  the  hills  and  waters,  the  fields  and  wildwood 
bowers. 
Smile  or  speak  more  tenderly,  clothed  with  peace  more 

deep, 
Here  than  memory  whispers  of  days  our  memories  keep 
III.  c 


82  A   BALLAD  OF  BATH. 

Fast  with  love  and  laughter  and  dreams  of  withered 
hours. 
Bright  were  these  as  blossom  of  old,  and  thought  endears 
Still  the  fair  soft  phantoms  that  pass  with  smiles  or  tears, 

Sweet  as  roseleaves  hoarded  and  dried  wherein  we  trace 
Still  the  soul  and  spirit  of  sense  that  lives  and  cheers  : 

Dawn  and  noon  and  sunset  are  one  before  thy  face. 

City  lulled  asleep  by  the  chime  of  passing  years, 
Sweeter  smiles  thy  rest  than  the  radiance  round  thy  peers; 

Only  love  and  lovely  remembrance  here  have  place. 
Time  on  thee  lies  hghter  than  music  on  men's  ears  ; 

Dawn  and  noon  and  sunset  are  one  before  thy  face. 


«3 


IN  A   GARDEN. 

Baby,  see  the  flowers  I 
— Baby  sees 
Fairer  things  than  these, 
Fairer  though  they  be  than  dreams  of  ours. 

Baby,  hear  the  birds  1 
— Baby  knows 
Better  songs  than  those, 
Sweeter  though  they  sound  than  sweetest  words. 

Baby,  see  the  moon  1 
— Baby's  eyes 
Laugh  to  watch  it  rise, 
Answering  light  with  love  and  night  with  noon. 

G  2 


84  TN  A   GARDEN. 

Baby,  hear  the  sea  ! 
— Baby's  face 
Takes  a  graver  grace, 
Touched  with  wonder  what  the  sound  may  be. 

Baby,  see  the  star  I 
— Baby's  hand 
Opens,  warm  and  bland, 
Cahn  in  claim  of  all  things  fair  that  are. 

Baby,  hear  the  bells  I 
— Baby's  head 
Bows,  as  ripe  for  bed. 
Now  the  flowers  curl  round  and  close  their  cells. 

Baby,  flower  of  light, 
Sleep,  and  see 
Brighter  dreams  than  we, 
Till  good  day  shall  smile  away  good  night 


^5 


A   RHYME, 

Babe,  if  rhyme  be  none 

For  that  sweet  small  word 
Babe,  the  sweetest  one 
Ever  heard, 

Right  it  is  and  meet 

Rhyme  should  keep  not  true 
Time  with  such  a  sweet 
Thing  as  you. 

Meet  it  is  that  rhyme 

Should  not  gain  such  grace : 
W^t  is  April's  prime 
To  your  face? 


86  A  RHYME, 

What  to  yours  is  May's 

Rosiest  smile?  what  sound 
Like  your  laughter  sways 
All  hearts  round? 

None  can  tell  in  metre 
Fit  for  ears  on  earth 
What  sweet  star  grew  sweeter 
At  your  birth. 

Wisdom  doubts  what  may  be  : 

Hope,  with  smile  sublime, 
Trusts  :  but  neither,  baby, 
Knows  the  rhyme. 

Wisdom  lies  down  lonely ; 

Hope  keeps  watch  from  far  ; 
None  but  one  seer  only 
Sees  the  star. 


A  RHYME.  87 

Love  alone,  with  yearning 

Heart  for  astrolabe, 
Takes  the  star's  height,  burning 
O'er  me  babe. 


88 


BABY-BIRD. 

Baby-bird,  baby-bird. 
Ne'er  a  song  on  earth 

May  be  heard,  may  be  heard. 
Rich  as  yours  in  mirth. 

All  your  flickering  fingers, 

All  your  twinkling  toes, 

Play  like  light  that  lingers 


Till  the  clear  song  close. 


Baby-bird,  baby-bird, 
Your  grave  majestic  eyes 

Like  a  bird's  warbled  words 
Speak,  and  sorrow  dies. 


BABY-BIRD.  89 

Sonow  dies  for  love's  sake, 

Love  grows  one  with  mirth. 
Even  for  one  white  dove's  saks. 

Born  a  babe  on  earth. 

Baby-bird,  baby-bird, 

Chirping  loud  and  long, 
Other  birds  hush  their  words, 

Hearkening  toward  your  song. 

Sweet  as  spring  though  it  ring. 

Full  of  love's  own  lures, 
Weak  and  wrong  sounds  their  song. 

Singing  after  yours. 

Baby-bird,  baby-bird. 

The  happy  heart  that  hears 
Seems  to  win  back  within 

Heaven,  and  cast  out  fears. 


BABY-BIRD. 

Earth  and  sun  seem  as  one 
6weet  light  and  one  sweet  word 

Known  of  none  here  but  one. 
Known  of  one  sweet  bird. 


91 


OUVE. 

L 

Who  may  praise  her  ? 
Eyes  where  midnight  shames  the  sun. 
Hair  of  night  and  sunshine  spun, 
Woven  of  dawn's  or  twilight's  loom. 
Radiant  darkness,  lustrous  gloom. 
Godlike  childhood's  flowerlike  bloom, 
None  may  praise  aright,  nor  sing 
Half  the  grace  wherewith  like  spring 

Love  arrays  her. 

n. 

Love  untold 
Sings  in  silence,  speaks  in  light 
Shed  from  each  fair  feature,  bright 


92  OLIVE, 

Still  from  heaven,  whence  toward  us,  now 
Nine  years  since,  she  deigned  to  bow 
Down  the  brightness  of  her  brow, 
Deigned  to  pass  through  mortal  birth  ; 
Reverence  calls  her,  here  on  earth. 
Nine  years  old. 


III. 

Love's  deep  duty, 
Even  when  love  transfigured  grows 
Worship,  all  too  surely  knows 
How,  though  love  may  cast  out  fear. 
Yet  the  debt  divine  and  dear 
Due  to  childhood's  godhead  here 
May  by  love  of  man  be  paid 
Never  ;  never  song  be  made 

Worth  its  beauty. 


OIJVE,  9) 

IV. 

Nought  is  all 
Sung  or  said  or  dreamed  or  thought 
F.ver,  set  beside  it  \  nought 
All  the  love  that  man  may  give — 
Love  whose  prayer  should  be,  *  Forgive  I* 
Heaven,  we  see,  on  earth  may  live  ; 
Earth  can  thank  not  heaven,  we  know, 
Save  with  songs  that  ebb  and  flow, 

Rise  and  falL 


V. 

No  man  living, 
No  man  dead,  save  haply  one 
Now  gone  homeward  past  the  sun. 
Ever  found  such  grace  as  might 
Tune  his  tongue  to  praise  aright 
Children,  flowers  of  love  and  light. 


94  OUVE. 

WTiom  our  praise  dispraises  :  wc 
Sing,  in  sooth,  but  not  as  he 
Sang  thanksgiving. 


VL 

Hope  that  smiled, 
Seeing  her  new-bom  beauty,  made 
Out  of  heaven's  own  hght  and  shades 
Smiled  not  half  so  sweetly  :  love, 
Seeing  the  sun,  afar  above, 
Warm  the  nest  that  rears  the  dove, 
Sees,  more  bright  than  moon  or  sun, 
All  the  heaven  of  heavens  in  one 

Little  child, 

VII. 

Who  may  sing  her? 
Wings  of  angels  when  they  stir 
Make  no  music  worthy  her  ; 


OUVE.  9S 

Sweeter  sound  her  shy  soft  words 
Here  than  songs  of  God's  own  birds 
Whom  the  fire  of  rapture  girds 
Round  with  light  from  love's  face  lit  5 
Hands  of  angels  find  no  fit 
Gifts  to  bring  her. 


VTIt. 

Babes  at  birth 
Wear  as  raiment  round  them  cast, 
Keep  as  witness  toward  their  past, 
Tokens  left  of  heaven ;  and  each. 
Ere  its  lips  learn  mortal  speech, 
Ere  sweet  heaven  pass  on  pass  reach, 
Bears  in  undiverted  eyes 
Proof  of  unforgotten  skies 

Here  on  earth. 


96  OLIVE. 

IX. 

Quenched  as  embers 
Quenched  with  flakes  of  rain  or  snow 
Till  the  last  faint  flame  burns  low, 
AH  those  lustrous  memories  lie 
Dead  with  babyhood  gone  by  : 
Yet  in  her  they  dare  not  die  : 
Others,  fair  as  heaven  is,  yet, 
Now  they  share  not  heaven,  forget : 

She  remembers. 


S7 


A    WORD    WITH   THE    WIND. 

IvORD  of  days  and  nights  that  hear  thy  word  of  wintry 
warning, 
Wind,  whose  feet  are  set  on  ways  that  none  may  tread. 
Change  the  nest  wherein  thy  wings  are  fledged  for  flight 
by  morning, 
Change  the  harbour  whence  at  dawn  thy  sails  are  spread. 
Not  the  dawn,  ere  yet  the  imprisoning  night   has  half 
released  her, 
More  desires  the  sun's  full  face  of  cheer,  than  we, 
Well  as  yet  we  love  the  strength  of  the  iron-tongued 
north-easter. 
Yearn  for  wind  to  meet  us  as  we  front  the  sea. 
All  thy  ways  are  good,  O  wind,  and  all  the  world  should 
fester, 
Were  thy  fourfold  godhead  queiKhed,  or  stilled  thy 
strife  : 
in.  D 


98  A    WORD    WITH  THE    WIND, 

Yet  the  waves  and  we  desire  too  long  the  deep  south- 
wester, 
Whence  the  waters  quicken  shoreward,  clothed  with 
life. 
Yet  the  field  not  made  for  ploughing  save  of  keels  nor 
harrowing 
Save  of  storm-winds  lies  unbrightened  by  thy  breath  : 
Banded  broad  with  ruddy  samphire  glow  the  sea-banks 
narrowing 
Westward,   while  the  sea  gleams   chill   and   still  as 
death. 
Sharp  and  strange  from  inland  sounds  thy  bitter  note  of 
battle, 
Blown  between  grim  skies  and  waters  sullen-souled. 
Till  the  baffled  seas  bear  back,  rocks  roar  and  shingles 
rattle. 
Vexed  and  angered  and  anhungered  and  acold. 
Change  thy  note,  and  give  the  waves  their  will,  and  all 
the  measure. 
Full  and  perfect,  of  the  music  of  their  might, 


A    JVORD    WITH   THE    WIND.  99 

Let  it  fill  the  bays  with  thunderous  notes  and  throbs  of 
pleasure, 
Shake   the  shores  "with  passion,  sound  at  once  and 
smite. 
Sweet  are  even  the  mild  low  notes  of  wind  and  sea,  but 
sweeter 
Sounds  the  song  whose  choral  wrath  of  raging  rhyme 
Bids  the  shelving  shoals  keep  tune  with  storm's  imperious 
metre, 
Bids  the  rocks  and  reefs  respond  in  rapturous  chime. 
Sweet  the  lisp  and  lulling  whisper  and  luxurious  laughter, 

Soft  as  love  or  sleep,  of  waves  whereon  the  sun 
Dreams,  and  dreams  not  of  the  darkling  hours  before  ncr 
after, 
Winged  with  cloud  whose  wrath  shall  bid  love's  day  be 
done. 
Yet  shall  darkness  bring  the  awakening  sea  a  lordlier 
lover, 
Clothed    with    strength    more    amorous    and    more 
strenuous  will, 

B  2 


loo  A    WORD    WITH  THE    WIND 

Whence  her  heart  of  hearts  shall  kindle  and  her  soul 
recover 
Sense  of  love  too  keen  to  he  for  love's  sake  still. 
Let  thy  strong  south-western  music  sound,  and  bid  the 
billows 
Brighten,  proud  and   glad   to   feel   thy  scourge  and 
kiss 
Sting  and  soothe  and  sway  them,  bowed  as  aspens  bend 
or  willows, 
Yet  resurgent  still  in  breathless  rage  of  bliss. 
All  to-day  the  slow  sleek  ripples  hardly  bear  up  shore- 
ward, 
Charged  with  sighs  more  light  than  laughter,  faint  and 
fair, 
Like  a  woodland  lake's  weak  wavelets  lightly  lingering 
forward. 
Soft  and  listless  as  the  slumber-stricken  air. 
Be  the  sunshine  bared  cw  veiled,   the  sky  superb  or 
shrouded. 
Still  the  waters,  lax  and  languid,  chafed  and  foiled. 


A    WORD    WITH  THE    WIND.  loi 

Keen  and  thwarted,  pale  and  patient,  clothed  with  fire  or 
clouded, 
Vex  their  heart  in  vain,  or  sleep  like  serpents  coiled. 
Thee  they  look  for,  blind  and  baffled,  wan  with  wrath  and 
weary. 
Blown  for  ever  back  by  winds  that  rock  the  bird : 
Winds  that  seamews  breast  subdue  the  sea,  and  bid  the 
dreary 
Waves  be  weak  as  hearts  made  sick  vsith  hope  de- 
ferred. 
Let  thy  clarion  sound  from  westward,  let  the  south  bear 
token 
How  the  glories  of  thy  godhead  sound  and  shine  : 
Bid  the  land  rejoice  to  see  the  land-wind's  broad  wings 
broken, 
Bid  the  sea  take  comfort,  bid  the  world  be  thine. 
Half  the  world  abhors  thee  beating  back  the  sea,  and 
blackening 
Heaven   with   fierce  and   woful   change  of  fluctuant 
form  : 


f02  A    WORD    WITH  THE   WIND. 

All  the  world  acclaims  thee  shifting  sail  again,  and  slack- 
ening 
Cloud  by  cloud  the  close-reefed  cordage  of  the  storm. 
Sweeter  fields  and  brighter  woods  and  lordlier  hills  than 
waken 
Here  at  sunrise  never  hailed  the  sun  and  thee  : 
Turn  thee  then,  and  give  them  comfort,  shed  Hke  rain 
and  shaken 
Far  as  foam  that  laughs  and  leaps  along  the  sea. 


I03 


NEAP-TIDE, 

Far  ofT  is  the  sea,  and  the  land  is  afar : 
The  low  banks  reach  at  the  sky, 
Seen  hence,  and  are  heavenward  high  ; 

Though  light  for  the  leap  of  a  boy  they  are. 
And  the  far  sea  late  was  nigh. 

The  fair  wild  fields  and  the  circling  downs. 
The  bright  sweet  marshes  and  meads 
All  glorious  with  flowerlike  weeds, 

The  great  grey  churches,  the  sea-washed  towns, 
Recede  as  a  dream  recedes. 

The  world  draws  back,  and  the  world's  light  wanes, 
As  a  dream  dies  down  and  is  dead  ; 
And  the  clouds  and  the  gleams  overhead 


104  NEAP-TIDE. 

Change,  and  change  ;  and  the  sea  remains, 
A  shadow  of  dreamlike  dread. 

Wild,  and  woful,  and  pale,  and  grey, 

A  shadow  of  sleepless  fear, 

A  corpse  with  the  night  for  bier, 
The  fairest  thing  that  beholds  the  day 

Lies  haggard  and  hopeless  here. 

And  the  wind's  wings,  broken  and  spent,  subside  ; 
And  the  dumb  waste  world  is  hoar, 
And  strange  as  the  sea  the  shore  ; 

And  shadows  of  shapeless  dreams  abide 
Where  life  may  abide  no  more. 

A  sail  to  seaward,  a  sound  from  shoreward. 
And  the  spell  were  broken  that  seems 
To  reign  in  a  world  of  dreams 

Where  vainly  the  dreamer's  feet  make  forward 
And  vainlv  the  low  sky  gleams. 


NEAP-TIDE.  105 

The  sea-forsaken  forlorn  deep -wrinkled 

Salt  slanting  stretches  of  sand 

That  slope  to  the  seaward  hand, 
Were  they   fain  of  the  ripples   that   flashed   and 
twinkled 

And  laughed  as  they  struck  the  strand  ? 


As  bells  on  the  reins  of  the  fairies  ring 
The  ripples  that  kissed  them  rang, 
The  light  from  the  sundawn  sprang, 

And  the  sweetest  of  songs  that  the  world  may  sing 
Was  theirs  when  the  full  sea  sang. 


Now  no  light  is  in  heaven  ;  and  now 
Not  a  note  of  the  sea-wind's  tune 
Rings  hither  :  the  bleak  sky's  boon 

Grants  hardly  sight  of  a  grey  sun's  brow— 
A  sun  more  sad  than  the  moon. 


166  NEAP-TIDE, 

More  sad  than  a  moon  that  clouds  beleaguer 

And  storm  is  a  scourge  to  smite, 

The  sick  sun's  shadowlike  light 
Grows  faint  as  the  clouds  and  the  waves  wax  eager, 

And  withers  away  from  sight 


The   day*s   heart    cowers,    and    the    night's   heart 
quickens: 
Full  fain  would  the  day  be  dead 
And  the  stark  night  reign  in  his  stead : 

The  sea  falls  dumb  as  the  sea-fog  thickens 
And  the  sunset  dies  for  dread. 


Outside  of  the  range  of  time,  whose  breath 
Is  keen  as  the  manslayer's  knife 
And  his  peace  but  a  truce  for  strife, 

\^Tio  knows  if  haply  the  shadow  of  death 
May  be  not  the  light  of  life  ? 


NEAP-TIDE,  107 

For  the  storm  and  the  rain  and  the  darkness  borrow 

But  an  hour  from  the  suns  to  be, 

But  a  strange  swift  passage,  that  we 
May  rejoice,  who  have  mourned  not  to-day,  to-morrow, 

In  the  sun  and  the  wind  and  the  sea. 


io8 


BV  THE   WAYSIDE, 

Summer's  face  was  rosiest,  skies  and  woods  were  mellow, 
Earth  had  heaven  to  friend,  and  heaven  had  earth  to 
fellow, 
When  we  met  where  wooded    hills    and    meadows 
meet 
Autumn's  face  is  pale,  and  all  her  late  leaves  yellow, 
Now  that  here  again  we  greet 


Wan  with  years  whereof  this  eightieth  nears  December, 
Fair  and  bright  with  love,  the  kind  old  face  I  know 
Shines  above  the  sweet  small  twain  whose  eyes  remembei 
Heaven,  and  fill  with  April's  light  this  pale  November, 
Though  the  dark  year's  glass  run  lov/. 


BY  THE    WAYSIDE.  109 

Like  a  rose  whose  joy  of  life  her  silence  utters 
When   the   birds   are   loud,   and   low    the   lulled   wind 
mutters, 

Grave  and  silent  shines  the  boy  nigh  three  years  old. 
Wise  and  sweet  his  smile,  that  falters  not  nor  flutters, 

Glows,  and  turns  the  gloom  to  gold. 

Like  the  new-bom  sun's  that  strikes  the  dark  and  slays  it. 
So  that  even  for  love  of  light  it  smiles  and  dies, 

Laughs   the   boy's   blithe   face   whose   fair  fourth  year 
arrays  it 

All  with  light  of  life  and  mirth  that  stirs  and  sways  it 
And  fulfils  the  deep  wide  eyes. 

Wide  and  warm  with  glowing  laughter's  exultation, 
Full  of  welcome,  full  of  sunbright  jubilation, 

Flash  my  taller  friend's  quick  eyebeams,  charged  with 
glee; 
But  with  softer  still  and  sweeter  salutation 

Shine  my  smaller  friend's  on  me. 


no  BY  THE    WAYSIDE. 

Little  arms  flung  round  my  bending  neck,  that  yoke  it 
Fast  in  tender  bondage,  draw  my  face  down  too 

Toward  the  flower-soft  face   whose  dumb  deep   smiles 
invoke  it  , 

Dumb,  but  love  can  read  the  radiant  eyes  that  woke  it. 
Blue  as  June's  mid  heaven  is  blue. 

How    may   men   find    refuge,    how   should   hearts    be 

shielded, 
From  the  weapons  thus  by  little  children  wielded. 

When  they  lift  such  eyes  as  light  this  lustrous  face — 
Eyes  that  woke  love  sleeping  unawares,  and  yielded 

Love  for  love,  a  gift  of  grace, 

Grace  beyond  man's  merit,  love  that  laughs,  forgiving 

Even  the  sin  of  being  no  more  a  child,  nor  worth 
Trust  and  love  that  lavish  gifts  above  man's  giving, 
Touch  or  glance  of  eyes  and  lips  the  sweetest  living, 
Fair  as  heaven  and  kind  as  earth  ? 


Ill 


NIGHT, 
U 

FROM    THE    ITALIAN    OF    GIOVANNI    STROZZI. 

Night,  whom  in  shape  so  sweet  thou  here  may'st  see 
Sleeping,  was  by  an  Angel  sculptured  thus 
In  marble,  and  since  she  sleeps  hath  life  like  us  : 

Thou  doubt'st?  Awake  her  :  she  will  speak  to  thee. 

IL 

FROM    THE    ITALIAN    OF    MICHELANGELO   BUONARROTI. 

Sleep  likes  me  well,  and  better  yet  to  know 

I  am  but  stone.     While  shame  and  grief  must  be, 
Good  hap  is  mine,  to  feel  not,  nor  to  see  : 

Take  heed,  then,  lest  thou  wake  me  :  ah,  speak  low. 


112 


IN  TIME  OF  MOURNING. 

*  Return,'  we  dare  not  as  we  fain 
Would  cry  from  hearts  that  yearn  : 

Love  dares  not  bid  our  dead  again 
Return. 

O  hearts  that  strain  and  bum 
As  fires  fast  fettered  bum  and  strain  1 
Bow  down,  lie  still,  and  learn. 

The  heart  that  healed  all  hearts  of  pain 

No  funeral  rites  inum  : 
Its  echoes,  while  the  stars  remain, 

Return, 


May,  1885. 


113 


THE  INTERPRETERS. 

L 

Days  dawn  on  us  that  make  amends  for  many 

Sometimes, 
When  heaven  and  earth  seem  sweeter  even  than  any 

Man's  rh)-mes. 

Light  had  not  all  been  quenched  in  France,  or  quelled 

In  Greece, 
Kad  Homer  sung  not,  or  had  Hugo  held 

His  peace. 

Had  Sappho's  self  not  left  her  word  tlnis  long 

For  token, 
The  sea  round  Lesbos  yet  in  waves  of  song 

Had  spoken. 
Hi.  I 


114  77/>^  INTERPRETERS, 

II. 

And  yet  these  days  of  subtler  air  and  finer 

Delight, 
When  lovelier  looks  the  darkness,  and  diviner 

The  light— 

The  gift  they  give  of  all  these  golden  hours, 

Whose  urn 
Pours  forth  reverberate  rays  or  shadowing  showers 

In  turn — 

Clouds,  beams,  and  winds  that  make  the  live  day's  track 

Seem  living — 
What  were  they  did  no  spirit  give  them  back 

Thanksgiving  ? 

III. 

Dead  air,  dead  fire,  dead  shapes  and  shadows,  telling 

Time  nought ; 
Man  gives  them  sense  and  soul  by  song,  and  dwelling 

In  thought. 


THE  INTERPRETERS.  115 

In  human  thought  their  being  endures,  their  jH^wer 

Abides  : 
Else  were  their  life  a  thing  that  each  light  hour 

Derides. 

The  years  live,  work,  sigh,  smile,  and  die,  with  all 

They  cherish  ; 
The  soul  endures,  though  dreams  that  fed  it  fall 

And  perish. 

IV. 

In  human  thought  have  all  things  habitation  ; 

Our  days 
T^ugh,  lower,  and  lighten  past,  and  find  no  station 

That  stays. 

But  thought  and  faith  are  mightier  things  than  time 

Can  wrong, 
Made  splendid  once  with  speech,  or  made  sublime 

By  song. 


ii6  THE  INTERPRETERS. 

Remembrance,  though  the  tide  of  change  that  rolls 

Wax  hoary, 
Gives  earth  and  heaven,  for  song's  sake  and  the  soul's, 

Their  glory. 

July  i6th,  18815. 


1X7 


THE  RECALL. 

Return,  they  cry,  ere  yet  your  day 

Set,  and  the  sky  grow  stern  : 
Return,  strayed  souls,  while  yet  ye  may 

Return. 

But  heavens  beyond  us  yearn  ; 
Yea,  heights  of  heaven  above  the  sway 
Of  stars  that  eyes  discern. 

The  soul  whose  wings  from  shoreward  stray 
Makes  toward  her  viewless  bourne 

Though  trustless  faith  and  unfaith  say, 
ReturiL 


Xi8 


BY  TWILIGHT. 

If  we  dream  that  desire  of  the  distance  above  us 
Should  be  fettered  by  fear  of  the  shadows  that  seem. 
If  we  wake,  to  be  nought,  but  to  hate  or  to  love  us 
If  we  dream, 

Night  sinks  on  the  soul,  and  the  stars  as  they  gleam 
Speak  menace  or  mourning,  with  tongues  to  reprove  us 
That  we  deemed  of  them  better  than  terror  may  deem. 

But  if  hope  may  not  lure  us,  if  fear  may  not  move  us, 
Thought  lightens  the  darkness  wherein  the  supreme 
Pure  presence  of  death  shall  assure  us,  and  prove  iia 
If  we  dream. 


i»9 


A    BABY'S  EPITAPH, 

April  made  me  :  winter  laid  me  here  away  asleep. 
Bright  as  Maytime  was  my  daytime  ;    night  is  soft  and 

deep  : 
Though  the  morrow  bring  forth  sorrow,  well  are  ye  that 

weep. 

Ye  that  held   me  dear  beheld  me  not   a   twelvemonth 

long  : 
All  the  while  ye  saw  me  smile,  ye  knew  not  whence  the 

song 
Came  that  made  me  smile,  and  laid  me  here,  and  wrought 

you  wrong. 


120  A   BABY'S  E.PITAPH. 

Angels,  calling  from  your  brawling  world  one  undefiled, 
Homeward  bade  me,  and  forbade  me  here  to  rest  be- 
guiled : 
Here  I  sleep  not :   pass,  and  weep  not  here  upon  your 
child. 


131 


ON  THE  DEATH  OF  SIR  HENRY  TAYLOR. 

Fourscore  and  five  times  has  the  gradual  year 
Risen  and  fulfilled  its  days  of  youth  and  eld 
Since  first  the  child's  eyes  opening  first  beheld 
Light,  who  now  leaves  behind  to  help  us  here 
Light  shed  from  song  as  starlight  from  a  sphere 
Serene  as  summer  ;  song  whose  charm  compelled 
The  sovereign  soul  made  flesh  in  Artevelde 
To  stand  august  before  us  and  austere, 
Half  sad  with  mortal  knowledge,  all  sublime 
With  trust  that  takes  no  taint  from  change  or  time, 
Trust  in  man's  might  of  manhood.     Strong  and  sage. 
Clothed  round  with  reverence  of  remembering  hearts, 
He,  twin-bom  with  our  nigh  departing  age. 
Into  the  light  of  peace  and  fame  departs. 


122 


IN  MEMORY  OF  JOHN   WILLIAM  INCH  BOLD. 

Farewell  :  how  should  not  such  as  thou  fare  well, 
Though  we  fare  ill  that  love  thee,  and  that  live, 

And  know,  whate'er  the  days  wherein  we  dwell 
May  give  us,  thee  again  they  will  not  give  ? 

Peace,  rest,  and  sleep  are  all  we  know  of  death, 
And  all  we  dream  of  comfort :  yet  for  thee, 

Whose  breath  of  life  was  bright  and  strenuous  breath, 
We  think  the  change  is  other  than  we  see. 

The  seal  of  sleep  set  on  thine  eyes  to-day 
Surely  can  seal  not  up  the  keen  swift  light 

That  lit  them  once  for  ever.     Night  can  slay 
None  save  the  children  of  the  womb  of  night. 


JOHN  WILUAM  IXCHBOLD.  \2\ 

The  fire  that  burns  up  dawn  to  bring  forth  noon 
Was  father  of  thy  spirit :  how  shouldst  thou 

Die  as  they  die  for  whom  the  sun  and  moon 
Are  silent?    Thee  the  darkness  holds  not  now  : 


Them,  while  they  looked  upon  the  light,  and  deemed 

Tliat  life  was  theirs  for  living  in  the  sun. 
The  darkness  held  in  bondage  :  and  they  dreamed, 

Who  knew  not  that  such  life  as  theirs  was  none. 

To  thee  the  sun  spake,  and  the  morning  sang 
Notes  deep  and  clear  as  life  or  heaven  :  the  sea 

That  sounds  for  them  but  wild  waste  music  rang 
Notes  that  were  lost  not  when  they  rang  for  thee. 

The  mountains  clothed  with  light  and  night  and  change. 

The  lakes  alive  with  wind  and  cloud  and  sun 
Made  answer,  by  constraint  sublime  and  strange, 

To  the  ardent  hand  that  bade  thy  will  be  done. 


124  JOHN  WILUAM  INCHBOLD. 

We  may  not  bid  the  mountains  mourn,  the  sea 
That  lived  and  lightened  from  thine  hand  again 

Moan,  as  of  old  would  men  that  mourned  as  we 
A  man  beloved,  a  man  elect  of  men, 

A  man  that  loved  them.     Vain,  divine  and  vain, 
The  dream  that  touched  with  thoughts  or  tears  of  ours 

The  spirit  of  sense  that  lives  in  sun  and  rain. 

Sings  out  in  birds,  and  breathes  and  fades  in  flowers. 

Not  for  our  joy  they  live,  and  for  our  grief 

They  die  not.   Though  thine  eye  be  closed,  thine  hand 
Powerless  as  mine  to  paint  them,  not  a  leaf 

In  English  woods  or  glades  of  Switzerland 

Falls  earlier  now,  fades  faster.     All  our  love 

Moves  not  our  mother's  changeless  heart,  who  gives 

A  little  hght  to  eyes  and  stars  above, 
A  little  life  to  each  man's  heart  that  lives. 


JOHN  WILUAM  INCH  BOLD.  125 

A  little  life  to  heaven  and  earth  and  sea, 
To  stars  and  souls  revealed  of  night  and  day, 

And  change,  the  one  thing  changeless  :  yet  shall  she 
Cease  too,  perchance,  and  perish.     Who  shall  say  ? 

Our  mother  Nature,  dark  and  sweet  as  sleep, 

And  strange  as  life  and  strong  as  death,  holds  fast, 

Even  as  she  holds  our  hearts  alive,  the  deep 
Dumb  secret  of  her  first-born  births  and  last. 

But  this,  we  know,  shall  cease  not  till  the  strife 
Of  nights  and  days  and  fears  and  hopes  find  end  ; 

This,  through  the  brief  eternities  of  life. 

Endures,  and  calls  from  death  a  living  friend ; 

The  love  made  strong  with  knowledge,  whence  confirmed 
The  whole  soul  takes  assurance,  and  the  past 

(So  by  time's  measure,  not  by  memory's,  termed) 
Lives  present  life,  and  mmgles  first  with  last 


126  JOHN  WILLIAM  INCH  BOLD. 

I,  now  long  since  thy  guest  of  many  days, 

Vvlio  found  thy  hearth  a  brother's,  and  with  thee 

Tracked  in  and  out  the  lines  of  rolling  bays 
And  banks  and  gulfs  and  reaches  of  the  sea — 

Deep  dens  wherein  the  wrestling  water  sobs 
And  pants  with  restless  pain  of  refluent  breath 

Till  all  the  sunless  hollow  sounds  and  throbs 
With  ebb  and  flow  of  eddies  dark  as  death — 

I  know  not  what  more  glorious  world,  what  waves 
More  bright  with  life, — if  brighter  aught  may  live 

Than  those  that  filled  and  fled  their  tidal  caves — 
May  now  give  back  the  love  thou  hast  to  give. 

Tintagel,  and  the  long  Trebarwith  sand, 
Lone  Camelford,  and  Boscastle  divine 

With  dower  of  southern  blossom,  bright  and  bland 
Above  the  roar  of  granite- baffled  brine, 


JOHN  IVILUAM  INCHBOIJ),  127 

Shall  hear  no  more  by  joyous  night  or  day 

From  downs  or  causeways  good  to  rove  and  ride 

Or  feet  of  ours  or  horse-hoofs  urge  their  way 
That  sped  us  here  and  there  by  tower  and  tide. 

The  headlands  and  the  hollows  and  the  waves, 
For  all  our  love,  forget  us  :  where  I  am 

Thou  art  not  :  deeper  sleeps  the  shadow  on  graves 
Than  in  the  sunless  gulf  that  once  we  swam. 

Thou  hast  swum  too  soon  the  sea  of  death  :  for  us 
Too  soon,  but  if  truth  bless  love's  blind  belief 

Faith,  bom  of  hope  and  memory,  says  not  thus  : 
And  joy  for  thee  for  me  should  mean  not  grief. 

And  joy  for  thee,  if  ever  soul  of  man 

Found  joy  in  change  and  life  of  ampler  birth 

Than  here  pens  in  the  spirit  for  a  span. 

Must  be  the  life  that  doubt  calls  death  on  earth. 


128  JOHN  WILUAM  INCH  BOLD 

For  if,  beyond  the  shadow  and  the  sleep, 
A  place  there  be  for  souls  without  a  stain, 

"N^Tiere  peace  is  perfect,  and  delight  more  deep 
Than  seas  or  skies  that  change  and  shine  again, 

There  none  of  all  unsullied  souls  that  live 
May  hold  a  surer  station  :  none  may  lend 

More  light  to  hope's  or  memory's  lamp,  nor  give 
More  joy  than  thine  to  those  that  called  thee  friend 

Yea,  joy  from  sorrow's  barren  womb  is  born 
When  faith  begets  on  grief  the  godlike  child  . 

As  midnight  yearns  with  starry  sense  of  morn 
In  Arctic  summers,  though  the  sea  wax  wild, 

So  love,  whose  name  is  memory,  thrills  at  heait. 
Remembering  and  rejoicing  in  thee,  now 

Alive  where  love  may  dream  not  what  thou  art 
But  knows  that  higher  than  hope  or  love  art  thou. 


JOHN  WILUAM  INCHBOLD.  129 

*  Whatever  heaven,  if  heaven  at  all  may  be, 
Await  the  sacred  souls  of  good  men  dead, 

There,  now  we  mourn  who  loved  him  here,  is  he.* 
So,  sweet  and  stem  of  speech,  the  Roman  said* 

Erect  in  grief,  in  trust  erect,  and  gave 

His  deathless  dead  a  deathless  life  even  here 

Where  day  bears  down  on  day  as  wave  on  wave 
And  not  man's  smile  fades  faster  than  his  tear 

Albeit  this  gift  be  given  not  me  to  give. 

Nor  power  be  mine  to  break  time's  silent  spell. 

Not  less  shall  love  that  dies  not  while  I  live 
Bid  thee,  beloved  in  hfe  and  death,  farewell 


iii. 


X 


X30 


NEW   YEARS  DAY, 

New  Year,  be  good  to  England.     Bid  her  name 
Shine  sunUke  as  of  old  on  all  the  sea  : 
Make  strong  her  soul  :  set  all  her  spirit  free  : 

Bind  fast  her  homeborn  foes  with  links  of  shame 

More  strong  than  iron  and  more  keen  than  flame  : 
Seal  up  their  lips  for  shame's  sake  :  so  shall  she 
Who  was  the  light  that  lightened  freedom  be, 

For  all  false  tongues,  in  all  men's  eyes  the  same. 

O  last-born  child  of  Time,  earth's  eldest  lord, 
God  undiscrowned  of  godhead,  who  for  man 
Begets  all  good  and  evil  things  that  live, 
Do  thou,  his  new-begotten  son,  implored 

Of  hearts  that  hope  and  fear  not,  make  thy  span 
Bright  with  such  light  as  history  bids  thee  giva 
Jan.  I,  18S9. 


131 


TO  SIR  RICHARD  F.  BURTON. 

(ON    HIS   TRANSLATION   OF  THE   ARABIAN    MGHl'S.) 

Westward  the  sun  sinks,  grave  and  glad  ;  but  far 
Eastward,  with  laughter  and  tempestuous  tears, 
Cloud,  rain,  and  splendour  as  of  orient  spears, 

Keen  as  the  sea's  thrill  toward  a  kindling  star. 

The  sundawn  breaks  the  barren  twilight's  bar 
And  fires  the  mist  and  slays  it.     Years  on  years 
Vanish,  but  he  that  hearkens  eastward  hears 

Bright  music  from  the  world  where  shadows  are. 

Where  shadows  are  not  shadows.     Hand  in  hand 
A  man's  word  bids  them  rise  and  smile  and  stand 

And  triumph.     All  that  glorious  orient  glows 
Defiant  of  the  dusk.     Our  twilight  land 
Trembles  ;  but  all  the  heaven  is  all  one  rose, 
Whence  laughing  love  dissolves  her  frosts  and  snows. 

K  a 


1^2 


NELL  GWYN, 

Sweet  heart,  that  no  taint  of  the  throne  or  the  stage 
Could  touch  with  unclean  transformation,  or  alter 
To  the  likeness  of  courtiers  whose  consciences  falter 

At  the  smile  or  the  frown,  at  the  mirth  or  the  rage, 

Of  a  master  whom  chance  could  inflame  or  assuage, 
Our  Lady  of  Laughter,  invoked  in  no  psalter, 
Adored  of  no  faithful  that  cringe  and  that  palter, 

Praise  be  with  thee  yet  from  a  hag-ridden  age. 

Our  Lady  of  Pity  thou  wast :  and  to  thee 

All  England,  whose  sons  are  the  sons  of  the  sea, 

Gives  thanks,  and  will  hear  not  ii  history  snarls 
When  the  name  of  the  friend  of  her  sailors  is  spoken  : 
And  thy  lover  she  cannot  but  love — by  the  token 

That  thy  name  was  the  last  on  the  lips  of  King  Charles* 


t3'J 


CALIBAN  ON  ARIEL. 
*Hii  backward  voice  is  to  utter  foul  speeches  and  to  detract.* 

The  tongue  is  loosed  of  that  most  l}ing  slave, 

"VVTiom  stripes  may  move,  not  kindness.    Listen  :  *  Lo, 
The  real  god  of  song,  Lord  Stephano, 

That's  a  brave  god,  if  ever  god  were  brave, 

And  bears  celestial  liquor  :  but,'  the  knave 
(A  most  ridiculous  monster)  howls,  *  we  know 
From  Ariel's  lips  what  springs  of  poison  flow, 

The  chicken-heart  blasphemer  !     Hear  him  rave  I  * 

Thou  poisonous  slave,  got  by  the  devil  himself 
Upon  thy  wicked  dam,  the  witch  whose  name 
Is  darkness,  and  the  sun  her  eyes'  offence, 
Though  hell's  hot  sewerage  breed  no  loathlier  elf. 
Men  cry  not  shame  upon  thee,  seeing  thy  shame 
So  perfect :  they  but  bid  thee — '  Hag-seed,  hence  1' 


K54 


THE    WEARY  WEDDING, 

O  DAUGHTER,  why  do  yc  laugh  and  weep, 

One  with  another? 
For  woe  to  wake  and  for  will  to  sleep, 

Mother,  ray  mother. 

But  weep  ye  winna  the  day  ye  wed. 

One  with  another. 
For  tears  are  dry  when  the  springs  are  dead. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

Too  long  have  your  tears  run  down  like  rain, 

One  with  another. 
For  a  long  love  lost  and  a  sweet  love  slain. 

Mother,  my  mother. 


THE   WEARY  WEDDING.  135 

Too  long  have  your  tears  dripped  down  like  dew, 

One  with  another. 
For  a  knight  that  my  sire  and  my  brethren  slew, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

Let  past  things  perish  and  dead  griefs  lie, 

One  with  another. 
O  fain  would  I  weep  not,  and  fain  would  I  die, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

Fair  gifts  we  give  ye,  to  laugh  and  hve, 

One  with  another. 
But  sair  and  strange  are  the  gifts  I  give. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  give  for  your  father's  love  ? 

One  with  another. 
Fruits  full  few  and  thorns  enough, 

lilother,  my  mother. 


136  THE    WEARY  WEDDING. 

And  what  will  ye  give  for  your  mother's  sake  ? 

One  with  another. 
Tears  to  brew  and  tares  to  bake, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  give  your  sister  Jean  i 

One  with  another. 
A  bier  to  build  and  a  babe  to  wean, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  give  your  sister  Nell  ? 

One  with  another. 
The  end  of  life  and  beginning  of  hell. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  give  your  sister  Kate  / 

One  with  another. 
Earth's  door  and  hell's  gate, 

Mother,  my  mother. 


THE    WEARY   WEDDING,  137 

And  what  will  ye  give  your  brother  Will  ? 

One  with  another. 
Life's  grief  and  world's  ill. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  give  your  brother  Hugh  ? 

One  with  another. 
A  bed  of  turf  to  turn  into, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  give  your  brother  John  ? 

One  with  another. 
The  dust  of  death  to  feed  upon, 

Mother,  my  mothei. 

And  what  will  ye  give  your  bauld  bridegroom  ? 

One  with  another. 
A  barren  bed  and  an  empty  room. 

Mother,  my  mother. 


138  THE    WEARY  WEDDING. 

And  what  will  ye  give  your  bridegroom's  friend  ? 

One  with  another. 
A  weary  foot  to  the  weary  end. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  give  your  blithe  bridesmaid  ? 

One  with  another. 
Grief  to  sew  and  sorrow  to  braid. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  drink  the  day  ye're  wed  i 

One  with  another. 
But  ae  drink  of  the  wan  well-head, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  whatten  a  water  is  that  to  draw  i 

One  with  another. 
We  maun  draw  thereof  a',  we  maun  drink  thereof  a*, 

Mother,  my  mother. 


THE    WEARY   WEDDING.  139 

And  what  shall  ye  pu'  where  the  well  rins  deep  ? 

One  with  another. 
Green  herb  of  death,  fine  flower  of  sleepy 

Mother,  my  mother. 

Are  there  ony  fishes  that  swim  therein  ? 

One  with  another. 
The  white  fish  grace,  and  the  red  fish  sin, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

Are  there  ony  birds  that  sing  thereby  ? 

One  with  another. 
O  when  they  come  thither  they  sing  till  they  die, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

Is  there  ony  draw-bucket  to  that  well-head  ? 

One  with  another. 
There's  a  wee  well-bucket  hangs  low  by  a  thread. 

Mother,  my  mother. 


I40  THE    WEARY  WEDDING, 

And  whatten  a  thread  is  that  to  spin  ? 

One  with  another. 
It's  green  for  grace,  and  it's  black  for  sin, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  strew  on  your  bride-chamber  floor  ? 

One  with  another. 
But  one  strewing  and  no  more, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  whatten  a  strewing  shall  that  one  be  ? 

One  with  another. 
The  dust  of  earth  and  sand  of  the  sea, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  take  to  build  your  bed  ? 

One  with  another. 
Sighing  and  shame  and  the  bones  of  the  dead. 

Mother,  my  mother. 


THE    WEARY  WEDDING,  141 

And  what  will  ye  wear  for  your  wedding  gown  ? 

One  with  another. 
Grass  for  the  green  and  dust  for  the  brown. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  wear  for  your  wedding  lace  ? 

One  with  another. 
A  heavy  heart  and  a  hidden  face, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  wear  for  a  wreath  to  your  head  ? 

One  with  another. 
Ash  for  the  white  and  blood  for  the  red. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

And  what  will  ye  wear  for  your  wedding  ring  ? 

One  with  another. 
A  weary  thought  for  a  weary  thing. 

Mother,  my  mother. 


Ui  THE    WEARY  WEDDING. 

And  what  shall  the  chimes  and  the  bell-ropes  play  ? 

One  with  another. 
A  weary  tune  on  a  weary  day, 

^lother,  my  mother. 

iVnd  what  shall  be  sung  for  your  wedding  song  ? 

One  with  another. 
A  weary  word  of  a  weary  wrong, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

The  world's  way  with  me  runs  back. 

One  with  another. 
Wedded  in  white  and  buried  in  bbck. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

The  world's  day  and  the  world's  niglit. 

One  with  another, 
Wedded  in  black  and  buried  in  white. 

Mother,  my  mother. 


THE    WEARY   WEDDING.  343 

The  world's  bliss  and  the  world's  teen, 

One  with  another, 
It's  red  for  white  and  it's  black  for  green, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

The  world's  will  and  the  world's  way, 

One  with  another, 
It's  sighing  for  night  and  crying  for  day. 

Mother,  my  mother. 

The  world's  good  and  the  world's  worth, 

One  with  another. 
It's  earth  to  flesh  and  it's  flesh  to  earth, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

When  she  came  out  at  the  kirkyard  gate, 

(One  with  another) 
The  bridegroom's  mother  was  there  in  wait 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 


144  THE   WEARY  WEDDING, 

O  mother,  where  is  my  great  green  bed, 

(One  with  another) 
Silk  at  the  foot  and  gold  at  the  head. 

Mother,  my  mother  ? 

Yea,  it  is  ready,  the  silk  and  the  gold, 

One  with  another. 
But  line  it  well  that  I  lie  not  cold, 

Mother,  my  mother. 

She  laid  her  cheek  to  the  velvet  and  vair, 

One  with  another ; 
She  laid  her  arms  up  under  her  hair. 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

Her  gold  hair  fell  through  her  arms  fu'  low, 

One  with  another : 
Lord  God,  bring  me  out  of  woe  I 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 


THE    WEARY  WEDDLXG.  145 

Her  gold  hair  fell  in  the  gay  reeds  green. 

One  with  another : 
Lord  God,  bring  me  out  of  teen  I 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 


O  mother,  where  is  my  lady  gone? 

(One  with  another.) 
In  the  bride-chamber  she  makes  sore  moan  : 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

Her  hair  falls  over  the  velvet  and  vair, 

(One  with  another)  ^ 

Her  great  soft  tears  fall  over  her  hair. 
(Mother,  my  mother.) 

When  he  came  into  the  bride's  chamber, 

(One  with  another) 
Her  hands  were  like  pale  yellow  amber. 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

III.  , 


146  THE   WEARY  WEDDING, 

Her  tears  made  specks  in  the  velvet  and  vair, 

(One  with  another) 
The  seeds  of  the  reeds  made  specks  in  her  hair. 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

He  kissed  her  under  the  gold  on  her  head  ; 

(One  with  another) 
The  lids  of  her  eyes  were  like  cold  lead. 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

He  kissed  her  under  the  fall  of  her  chin  ; 

(One  with  another) 
There  was  right  little  blood  therein. 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

He  kissed  her  under  her  shoulder  sweet  j 

(One  with  another) 
Her  throat  was  weak,  with  little  heat. 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 


THE   WEARY  WEDDING.  147 

He  kissed  her  down  by  her  breast- flowers  red, 

One  with  another ; 
They  were  Hke  river- flowers  dead. 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

What  ails  you  now  o'  your  weeping,  wife  ? 

(One  with  another.) 
It  ails  me  sair  o*  my  very  life, 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

What  ails  you  now  o'  your  weary  ways  i 

(One  with  another.) 
It  ails  me  sair  o'  my  long  life-days. 

(Mother,  my  mother) 

Nay,  ye  are  young,  ye  are  over  fair. 

(One  with  another.) 
Though  I  be  young,  what  needs  ye  care  ? 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 


1 48  THE    WEARY  WEDDING. 

Nay,  ye  are  fair,  ye  are  over  sweet. 

(One  with  another.) 
Though  I  be  fair,  what  needs  ye  greets 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

Nay,  ye  are  mine  while  I  hold  my  life. 

(One  with  another.) 
O  fool,  will  ye  marry  the  worm  for  a  wife  ? 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

Nay,  ye  are  mine  while  I  have  my  breath. 

(One  with  another.) 
O  fool,  will  ye  marry  the  dust  of  death  ? 

(Mother,  my  mother.) 

Yea,  ye  are  mine,  we  are  handfast  wed, 

One  with  another. 
Nay,  I  am  no  man's  ;  nay,  I  am  dead. 

Mother,  my  mother. 


249 


THE    WINDS, 

O  WEARY  fa'  the  east  wind, 

And  weary  fa'  the  west : 
And  gin  I  were  under  the  wan  waves  wide 

I  wot  weel  wad  I  rest 

O  weary  fa'  the  north  wind. 

And  weary  fa'  the  south  : 
The  sea  went  ower  my  good  lord's  head 

Or  ever  he  kissed  my  mouth. 

Weary  fa'  the  windward  rocks, 

And  weary  fa'  the  lee  : 
They  might  hae  sunken  sevenscore  ships, 

And  let  my  love's  gang  free. 


rjo  THE   WINDS. 

And  weary  fa*  ye,  mariners  a', 

And  weary  fa'  the  sea  : 
It  might  hae  taken  an  hundred  men, 

And  let  my  ae  love  Vie. 


'5' 


A   LYKE-WAKE  SOXG, 

Fair  of  face,  full  of  pride, 

Sit  ye  down  by  a  dead  man's  side. 

Ye  sang  songs  a'  the  day  : 

Sit  down  at  night  in  the  red  worm's  way. 

Proud  ye  were  a'  day  long  : 
Yell  be  but  lean  at  evensong. 

Ye  had  gowd  kells  on  your  hair : 
Nae  man  kens  what  ye  were. 

Ye  set  scorn  by  the  silken  stuff : 
Now  the  grave  is  clean  enough. 


152  A   LYKE-WAKE  SONG. 

Ye  set  scorn  by  the  nibis  ring  : 
Now  the  worm  is  a  saft  sweet  thing 

Fine  gold  and  blithe  fair  face, 
Ye  are  come  to  a  grimly  place. 

Gold  hair  and  glad  grey  een, 
Nae  man  kens  if  ye  have  been. 


153 


A   REIVERS  NECK-VERSE. 

Some  die  singing,  and  some  die  swinging, 

And  weel  mot  a'  they  be  : 
Some  die  playing,  and  some  die  praying, 

And  I  wot  sae  winna  we,  my  dear, 

And  I  wot  sae  winna  we. 

Some  die  sailing,  and  some  die  wailing, 

And  some  die  fair  and  free  : 
Some  die  flyting,  and  some  die  fighting, 

But  I  for  a  fause  love's  fee,  my  dear. 

But  I  for  a  fause  love's  fee. 

Some  die  laughing,  and  some  die  quaffing, 
And  some  die  high  on  tree  : 


154  A    REIVER'S  NECK-VERSE. 

Some  die  spinning,  and  some  die  sinning, 
But  faggot  and  fire  for  ye,  my  dear, 
Faggot  and  fire  for  ye. 

Some  die  weeping,  and  some  die  sleeping, 

And  some  die  under  sea  : 
Some  die  ganging,  and  some  die  hanging, 

And  a  twine  of  a  tow  for  me,  my  dear, 

A  twine  of  a  tow  for  me. 


155 


THE    WITCH-MOTHER, 

•O  WHERE  will  ye  gang  to  and  where  will  ye  sleep, 
Against  the  night  begins  ?  ' 

*  My  bed  is  made  wi'  cauld  sorrows, 

My  sheets  are  lined  wi'  sins. 

'  And  a  sair  grief  sitting  at  my  foot, 

And  a  sair  grief  at  my  head  ; 
And  dule  to  lay  me  my  laigh  pillows, 

And  teen  till  I  be  dead. 

*  And  the  rain  is  sair  upon  my  face, 

And  sair  upon  my  hair  ; 
And  the  wind  upon  my  wear}-  mouth. 
That  never  may  man  kiss  mair. 


156  THE    WITCH-MOTHER. 

*  And  the  snow  upon  my  heavy  lips, 

That  never  shall  drink  nor  eat ; 
And  shame  to  cledding,  and  woe  to  wedding, 
And  pain  to  drink  and  meat 

*  But  woe  be  to  my  bairns'  father, 

And  ever  ill  fare  he  : 
He  has  tane  a  braw  bride  hame  to  him. 
Cast  out  my  bairns  and  me. ' 

*  And  what  shall  they  have  to  their  marriage  meat 

This  day  they  twain  are  wed  ?  * 
'  Meat  of  strong  crying,  salt  of  sad  sighing, 
And  God  restore  the  dead.* 

*  And  what  shall  they  have  to  their  wedding  wine 

This  day  they  twain  are  wed  ? ' 

*  Wine  of  weeping,  and  draughts  of  sleeping, 

And  God  raise  up  the  dead.' 


THE    WITCH-MOTHER.  157 

She's  tane  her  to  the  wild  woodside, 

Between  the  flood  and  fell  : 
She's  sought  a  rede  against  her  need 

Of  the  fiend  that  bides  in  hell 

She's  tane  her  to  the  wan  burnside, 
She's  wrought  wi'  sang  and  spell : 

She's  plighted  her  soul  for  doom  and  dole 
To  the  fiend  that  bides  in  hell. 

She's  set  her  young  son  to  her  breast, 

Her  auld  son  to  her  knee  : 
Says,  *  Weel  for  you  the  night,  bairnies, 

And  weel  the  morn  for  me.' 

She  looked  fu'  lang  in  their  een,  sighing, 

And  sair  and  sair  grat  she  : 
She  has  slain  her  young  son  at  her  breast, 

Her  auld  son  at  her  knee. 


158  THE    WITCH-MOTHER, 

She's  sodden  their  flesh  wi'  saft  water. 
She's  mixed  their  blood  with  wine  : 

She's  tane  her  to  the  braw  bride-house, 
Where  a'  were  boun'  to  dine. 

She  poured  the  red  wine  in  his  cup, 
And  his  een  grew  fain  to  greet : 

She  set  the  baked  meats  at  his  hand, 
And  bade  him  drink  and  eat. 

Says,  '  Eat  your  fill  of  your  flesh,  my  lord, 
And  drink  your  fill  of  your  wine ; 

For  a'  thing's  yours  and  only  yours 
That  has  been  yours  and  mine.* 

Says,  *  Drink  your  fill  of  your  wine,  my  lord, 
And  eat  your  fill  of  your  bread  : 

I  would  they  were  quick  in  my  body  again. 
Or  T  that  bare  them  dead  ' 


THE    WITCH-MOTHER.  159 

He  struck  her  head  frae  her  fair  body, 

And  dead  for  grief  he  fell : 
And  there  were  twae  mair  sangs  in  heaven 

And  twae  mair  sauls  in  bell. 


X6o 


THE  BRIDE'S  TRAGEDY. 

^  The  wind  wears  roun',  the  day  wears  doun, 

The  moon  is  grisly  grey  ; 
There's  nae  man  rides  by  the  mirk  muirsides, 
Nor  down  the  dark  Tyne's  way.' 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

'And  winna  ye  watch  the  night  wi'  me, 

And  winna  ye  wake  the  morn  ? 
Foul  shame  it  were  that  your  ae  mither 
Should  brook  her  ae  son's  scorn.' 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 


THE  BRIDE'S   TRAGEDY.  i6x 

«0  mither,  I  may  not  sleep  nor  stay. 

My  weird  is  ill  to  dree  ; 
For  a  fause  faint  lord  of  the  south  seaboard 
Wad  win  my  bride  of  me.* 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

*The  winds  are  Strang,  and  the  nights  are  lang, 

And  the  ways  are  sair  to  ride  : 
And  I  maun  gang  to  wreak  my  wrang, 
And  ye  maun  bide  and  bide.' 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

•  Gin  I  maun  bide  and  bide,  Willie, 

I  wot  my  weird  is  sair  : 
Weel  may  ye  get  ye  a  light  love  yet, 
But  never  a  mither  mair.* 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

IIL  ^ 


i62  THE  BRIDE'S   TRAGEDY, 

*  O  gin  the  morrow  be  great  wi'  sorrow, 

The  wyte  be  yours  of  a'  : 
But  though  ye  slay  me  that  baud  and  stay  me, 
The  weird  ye  will  maun  fa'/ 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

When  cocks  were  crawing  and  day  was  dawing, 

He's  boun'  him  forth  to  ride  : 
And  the  ae  first  may  he's  met  that  day 
Was  fause  Earl  Robert's  bride. 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin, 

O  Withe  and  braw  were  the  bride-folk  a'. 

But  sad  and  saft  rade  she  ; 
And  sad  as  doom  was  her  fause  bridegroom. 
But  fair  and  fain  was  he. 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 


THE  BRIDE'S  TRAGEDY,  163 

*  And  winna  ye  bide,  sae  saft  ye  ride, 

And  winna  ye  speak  wi'  me  ? 
For  mony's  the  word  and  the  kindly  word 
I  have  spoken  aft  wi'  thee.* 

In,  in,  out  and  in, 

Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

♦  My  lamp  was  lit  yestreen,  Willie, 

My  window-gate  was  wide  : 
But  ye  camena  nigh  me  till  day  came  by  nie 
And  made  me  not  your  bride.' 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

He's  set  his  hand  to  her  bridle-rein, 

He's  turned  her  horse  away  : 
And  the  cry  was  sair,  and  the  wrath  was  mair, 
And  fast  and  fain  rode  they. 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

tt  3 


l64  THE  BRIDE'S    TRAGEDY, 

But  wlien  they  came  by  Chollerford, 

I  wot  the  ways  were  fell ; 
For  broad  and  brown  the  spate  swang  down. 
And  the  lift  was  mirk  as  hell. 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

*  And  will  ye  ride  yon  fell  water, 

Or  will  ye  bide  for  fear  ? 
Nae  scathe  ye'U  win  o'  your  father's  kia, 
Though  they  should  slay  me  here.' 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

*  I  had  liefer  ride  yon  fell  water, 

Though  strange  it  be  to  ride, 
Than  I  wad  stand  on  the  fair  green  strand 
And  thou  be  slain  beside.' 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 


THE  BRIBERS  TRAGEDY,  16; 

•  I  had  liefer  swim  yon  wild  water, 

Though  sair  it  be  to  bide, 
Than  I  wad  stand  at  a  strange  man's  hand, 
To  be  a  strange  man's  bride.' 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

•  I  had  liefer  drink  yon  dark  water, 

Wi'  the  stanes  to  make  my  bed. 
And  the  faem  to  hide  me,  and  thou  beside  me, 
Than  I  wad  see  thee  dead/ 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 

Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin- 
He's  kissed  her  twice,  he's  kissed  her  thnce, 

On  cheek  and  hp  and  chin  : 
He's  wound  her  rein  to  his  hand  again, 
And  lightly  they  leapt  in. 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 


i66  THE  BRIDE'S   TRAGEDY. 

Their  hearts  were  high  to  live  or  die, 

Their  steeds  were  stark  of  limb  : 
But  the  stream  was  starker,  the  spate  was  darker. 
Than  man  might  live  and  swim. 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

The  first  ae  step  they  strode  therem, 

It  smote  them  foot  and  knee  : 
But  ere  they  wan  to  the  mid  water 
The  spate  was  as  the  sea. 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 

But  when  they  wan  to  the  mid  water, 

It  smote  them  hand  and  head  : 
And  nae  man  knows  but  the  wave  that  flows 
Where  they  lie  drowned  and  dead. 
In,  in,  out  and  in, 
Blaws  the  wind  and  whirls  the  whin. 


I67 


A  JACOBITES  FAREWELL, 
1716. 

There's  nae  mair  lands  to  tyne,  my  dear, 

And  nae  mair  lives  to  gie  : 
Though  a  man  think  sair  to  live  nae  mair. 

There's  but  one  day  to  die 

For  a'  things  come  and  a'  days  gane, 
What  needs  ye  rend  your  hair  ? 

But  kiss  me  till  the  morn's  morrow, 
Then  I'll  kiss  ye  nae  mair. 

O  lands  are  lost  and  life's  losing, 

And  what  were  they  to  gie  ? 
Fu'  mony  a  man  gives  all  he  ozsi^ 

But  nae  man  else  gives  ye. 


i68  A  JACOBITE'S  FAREWELL. 

Our  king  wons  ower  the  sea's  water, 

And  I  in  prison  sair  : 
But  I'll  win  out  the  morn's  morrow, 

And  ye'U  see  me  nae  mair 


169 


A  JACOBfrES  EXILE, 
1746. 

The  weary  day  rins  down  and  dies. 
The  weary  night  wears  through  : 

And  never  an  hour  is  fair  wi'  flower, 
And  never  a  flower  wi'  dew. 

I  would  the  day  were  night  for  me, 

I  would  the  night  were  day : 
For  then  would  1  stand  in  my  ain  fair  land. 

As  now  in  dreams  1  may. 

O  lordly  flow  the  Loire  and  Seine, 

And  loud  the  dark  Durance  : 
But  bonnier  shine  the  braes  of  Tyne 

Than  a'  the  fields  of  France ; 


I70  A  JACOBITE'S  EXILE. 

And  the  waves  of  Till  that  speak  sae  stiU 
Gleam  goodlier  where  they  glance. 


O  weel  were  they  that  fell  fighting 

On  dark  Drumossie's  day: 
They  keep  their  hame  ayont  the  faem, 

And  we  die  far  away. 

O  sound  they  sleep,  and  saft,  and  deep, 

But  night  and  day  wake  we  ; 
And  ever  between  the  sea-banks  green 

Sounds  loud  the  sundering  sea. 

And  ill  we  sleep,  sae  sair  we  weep, 

But  sweet  and  fast  sleep  they  ; 
And  the  mool  that  haps  them  roun'  and  laps  them 

Is  e'en  their  country's  clay ; 
But  the  land  we  tread  that  are  not  dead 

Is  strange  as  nis;ht  by  day. 


A  JACOBITE'S  EXILE.  171 

Strange  as  night  in  a  strange  man's  sight, 

Though  fair  as  dawn  it  be : 
For  what  is  here  that  a  stranger's  cheer 

Should  yet  wax  blithe  to  see? 

The  hills  stand  steep,  the  dells  lie  deep, 

The  fields  are  green  and  gold : 
The  hill-streams  sing,  and  the  hill-sides  ring^ 

As  ours  at  home  of  old. 

But  hills  ana  dowers  are  nane  of  ours, 

And  ours  are  oversea : 
And  the  kind  strange  land  whereon  we  stand. 

It  wotsna  what  were  we 
Or  ever  we  came,  wi'  scathe  and  shame, 

To  try  what  end  might  be. 

Scathe,  and  shame,  and  a  waefu'  name, 

And  a  weary  time  and  strange. 
Have  they  that  seeing  a  weird  for  dreeing 

Can  die,  and  cannot  change. 


172  A  JACOBITE'S  EXILE. 

Shame  and  scorn  may  we  thole  that  mourn. 

Though  sair  be  they  to  dree  : 
But  ill  may  we  bide  the  thoughts  we  hide, 

Mair  keen  than  wind  and  sea. 

Ill  may  we  thole  the  night's  watches, 

And  ill  the  weary  day  : 
And  the  dreams  that  keep  the  gates  of  sleep, 

A  waefu'  gift  gie  they  ; 
For  the  sangs  they  sing  us,  the  sights  they  bring  us, 

The  mom  blaws  all  away. 

On  Aikenshaw  the  sun  blinks  braw, 

The  burn  rins  blithe  and  fain : 
There's  nought  wi'  me  I  wadna  gie 

To  look  thereon  again. 

On  Keilder-side  the  wind  blaws  ^nde  ; 

There  sounds  nae  hunting-horn 
That  rings  sae  sweet  as  the  winds  that  beat 

Round  banks  where  Tyne  is  bom. 


A  JACOBITE'S  EXILE.  173 

The  Wansbeck  sings  with  all  her  springs. 

The  bents  and  braes  give  ear  ; 
But  the  wood  that  rings  wi'  the  sang  she  sings 

I  may  not  see  nor  hear ; 
For  far  and  far  thae  blithe  burns  are, 

And  strange  is  a'  thing  near. 

The  light  there  lightens,  the  day  there  brightens, 

The  loud  wind  there  lives  free  : 
Nae  light  comes  nigh  me  or  wind  blaws  by  me 

That  I  wad  hear  or  see. 

But  O  gin  I  were  there  again. 

Afar  ayont  the  faem, 
Cauld  and  dead  in  the  sweet  saft  bed 

That  haps  my  sires  at  hame  ! 

Well  see  nae  mair  the  sea -banks  fair, 
And  the  sweet  grey  gleaming  sky, 


174  ^  JACOBITE'S  EXILE, 

And  the  lordly  strand  of  Northumberland, 
And  the  goodly  towers  thereby  : 

And  none  shall  know  but  the  winds  that  blow 
The  graves  wherein  we  lie. 


175 


THE   TYNESIDE    WIDOW. 

There's  mony  a  man  loves  land  and  life, 
Loves  life  and  land  and  fee  ; 

And  mony  a  man  loves  fair  women, 
But  never  a  man  loves  me,  my  lov^ 
But  never  a  man  loves  me. 

O  weel  and  weel  for  a'  lovers, 

I  wot  weel  may  they  be ; 
And  weel  and  weel  for  a'  fair  maidens, 

But  aye  mair  woe  for  me,  my  love. 

But  aye  mair  woe  for  me, 

O  weel  be  wi'  you,  ye  sma'  flowers. 
Ye  flowers  and  every  tre^ ; 


176  THE   TYNESIDE    WIDOW, 

And  weel  be  wi'  you,  a'  birdies, 
But  teen  and  tears  wi'  me,  my  love, 
But  teen  and  tears  wi'  me. 

O  weel  be  yours,  my  three  brethren, 

And  ever  weel  be  ye ; 
Wi'  deeds  for  doing  and  loves  for  wooing, 

But  never  a  love  for  me,  my  love, 

But  never  a  love  for  me. 

And  weel  be  yours,  my  seven  sisters, 

And  good  love-days  to  see, 
And  long  life-days  and  true  lovers, 

But  never  a  day  for  me,  my  love, 

But  never  a  day  for  me. 

Good  times  wi'  you,  ye  bauld  riders, 
By  the  hieland  and  the  lee  ; 

And  by  the  leeland  and  by  the  hielana 
It's  weary  times  wi'  me,  my  love. 
It's  weary  times  wi'  me. 


THE   TYNESIDE    WIDOW.  \T7 

Good  days  wi'  you,  ye  good  sailors, 

Sail  in  and  out  the  sea ; 
And  by  the  beaches  and  by  the  reaches 

It's  heavy  days  wi'  me,  my  love, 

It's  heavy  days  wi'  me. 

I  had  his  kiss  upon  my  mouth. 

His  bairn  upon  my  knee  ; 
I  would  my  soul  and  body  were  twain, 

And  the  bairn  and  the  kiss  wi'  me,  my  love, 

And  the  bairn  and  the  kiss  wi'  me. 

The  bairn  down  in  the  mools,  my  dear, 

O  saft  and  saft  lies  she  ; 
I  would  the  mools  were  ower  my  head, 

And  the  young  bairn  fast  wi'  me,  my  love, 

And  the  young  bairn  fast  wi'  me. 

The  father  under  the  faem,  my  dear, 
O  sound  and  sound  sleeps  he ; 


J 78  THE   TYNESIDE    WIDOW, 

I  would  the  faem  were  ower  my  face, 
And  the  father  lay  by  me,  my  love, 
And  the  father  lay  by  me. 

I  would  the  faem  were  ower  my  face, 
Or  the  mools  on  my  ee-bree ; 

And  waking-time  with  a*  lovers, 
But  sleeping-time  wi'  me,  my  love, 
But  sleeping-time  wi'  me. 

I  would  the  mools  were  meat  in  my  mouth, 

The  saut  faem  in  my  ee  ; 
And  the  land-worm  and  the  water-worm 

To  feed  fu'  sweet  on  me,  my  lov^ 

To  feed  fu'  sweet  on  me. 

My  hfe  is  sealed  with  a  seal  of  love^ 
And  locked  with  love  for  a  key  ; 

And  I  lie  wrang  and  I  w^ake  lang, 
But  ye  tak'  nae  thought  for  me,  my  love, 
But  ye  tak'  nae  thought  for  me. 


THE  TYNESTDE   WIDOW,  179 

We  were  weel  fain  of  love,  my  dear, 

0  fain  and  fain  were  we  ; 

It  was  weel  with  a'  the  weary  world. 
But  O,  sae  weel  wi'  me,  my  love, 
But  O,  sae  weel  wi'  me. 

We  were  nane  ower  mony  to  sleep,  my  dear, 

1  wot  we  were  but  three  ; 

And  never  a  bed  in  the  weary  world 

For  my  bairn  and  my  dear  and  me,  my  love, 
For  my  bairn  and  my  dear  and  me. 


i8o 


DEDICATION. 

The  years  are  many,  the  changes  more, 
Since  wind  and  sun  on  the  wild  sweet  shore 

Where  Joyous  Gard  stands  stark  by  the  sea 
With  face  as  bright  as  in  years  of  yore 

Shone,  swept,  and  sounded,  and  laughed  for  glee 
More  deep  than  a  man's  or  a  child's  may  be, 
On  a  day  when  summer  was  wild  and  glad. 
And  the  guests  of  the  wind  and  the  sun  were  we. 

The  light  that  lightens  from  seasons  clad 
With  darkness  now,  is  it  glad  or  sad  ? 

Not  sad  but  glad  should  it  shine,  meseems, 
On  eyes  yet  fain  of  the  joy  they  had. 


DEDICATION.  181 

For  joy  was  there  with  us  ;  joy  that  gleams 
And  murmurs  yet  in  .the  world  of  dreams 

Where  thought  holds  fast,  as  a  constant  warder, 
The  days  when  I  rode  by  moors  and  streams. 

Reining  my  rhjTues  into  buoyant  order 
Through  honied  leagues  of  the  northland  border. 

Though  thought  or  memory  fade,  and  prove 
A  faithless  keeper,  a  thriftless  hoarder, 

One  landmark  never  can  change  remove. 
One  sign  can  the  years  efface  not     Love, 

More  strong  than  death  or  than  doubt  may  be, 
Treads  down  their  strengths,  and  abides  above. 

Yea,  change  and  death  are  his  servants  :  we. 
Whom  love  of  the  dead  links  fast,  though  free. 

May  smile  as  they  that  beheld  the  dove 
Bear  home  her  signal  across  the  sea. 


PRINTRD    BY 

SrOTTISWOODE   AND   CO.    LTD.,    LONDON 

COLCHESTER   AND   ETON 


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